February 2016 the good life

FLYING WITH MIKE LEACH Y EVENTS CALENDAR

WENATCHEE VALLEY’S

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February 2016

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Contents page 18

missed turn leads to gorgeous detour

Features

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flying with mike leach

What do you do when a famous person sits down next to you on an airplane? You try not to fumble the opportunity for a great story

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Kitchen & Bath Designs

an international yarn tale

Scottish sheep, Mexican weavers, and a rug hanging on a Leavenworth wall

10 skiing in japan

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Author goes bonkers for the insane amount of deep white powder at Japan’s Niseko ski resort

12 camping in paradise

When Eron Drew and her family went to Hawaii, they decided to skip the resorts and do a road trip in a VW van

14 white cane walking

The ins and outs of learning to walk with a white cane: It’s not as easy as it may look

16 bird watching from a kayak

Two passions combined for a great time in the outdoors

20 HIGH, WIDE AND HANDSOME

House on a hill above Sleepy Hollow offers more than just another pretty view

Turning 65 or new to the area?

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ART SKETCHES

n Guitar maker Freeman Keller, page 30 n Collage and garden artist Lois Pendleton, page 32 Columns & Departments 24 Pet Tales: Little Miss Molly 25 Bonnie Orr: Favorite tools in the kitchen 26 June Darling: Love is the answer 28 The traveling doctor: A balm for Alzheimer’s 29 The night sky: February’s parade of planets 30-35 Arts & Entertainment & a Dan McConnell cartoon 36 History: Who was Tom Doak?

38 Alex Saliby: News in the wine world February 2016 | The Good Life

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OPENING SHOT

®

Year 10, Number 2 February 2016 The Good Life is published by NCW Good Life, LLC, dba The Good Life 10 First Street, Suite 108 Wenatchee, WA 98801 PHONE: (509) 888-6527 EMAIL: editor@ncwgoodlife.com

sales@ncwgoodlife.com ONLINE: www.ncwgoodlife.com FACEBOOK: https://www. facebook.com/NCWGoodLife Editor/Publisher, Mike Cassidy Contributors, Dale Blair, Beverly Jagla, Mary Schramm, Maureen Stivers, Eron Drew, Ken Anderson, Jean Moraga, Lance Stegemann, Travis Knoop, Donna Cassidy, Bonnie Orr, Alex Saliby, Jim Brown, June Darling, Dan McConnell, Susan Lagsdin, Peter Lind and Rod Molzahn Advertising manager, Terry Smith Advertising sales, Lianne Taylor and Donna Cassidy Bookkeeping and circulation, Donna Cassidy Proofing, Dianne Cornell Ad design, Clint Hollingsworth TO SUBSCRIBE: For $25, ($30 out of state address) you can have 12 issues of The Good Life mailed to you or a friend. Send payment to: The Good Life 10 First Street, Suite 108 Wenatchee, WA 98801 For circulation questions, email: donna@ncwgoodlife.com BUY A COPY of The Good Life at Hastings, Safeway stores, Walgreens, Mike’s Meats at Pybus, Rhubarb Market, Martin’s Market Place (Cashmere) and A Book for All Seasons (Leavenworth) ADVERTISING: For information about advertising in The Good Life, contact advertising at (509) 8886527, or sales@ncwgoodlife.com

dainty deer in the snow

By Dale Blair

I really enjoy snowshoe hik-

ing around the Saddle Rock area.

A few years ago I was in this area and I spotted a group of deer just below me on the trail.

I made my way down the hill and got a few okay photos of the group.

Dale Blair is a passionate photographer in his spare time. His “real job” is working as the director of the Wenatchee High School Sports Medicine Program.

On the cover Jim McVay and Pamela Mullen make an annual pilgrimage to a beautiful place — this time on the Indian Creek Trail near the White River Falls — where they repeat their wedding tributes to each other.

See June Darling’s column on page 26.

Photo by John Darling

Keep Moving Physical Therapy for All Ages and Abilities

WRITE FOR THE GOOD LIFE: We welcome articles about people from Chelan and Douglas counties.

Send your idea to Mike Cassidy at editor@ncwgoodlife.com

The Good Life® is a registered trademark of NCW Good Life, LLC. Copyright 2015

by NCW Good Life, LLC.

As I slowly worked my way back up the hill, I startled this deer.

I quickly pulled my camera up. He froze and looked straight into my lens and raised his leg up. It turned out to be a favorite photo and my wife and I used it as our Christmas card the next year.

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February 2016

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editor’s notes

MIKE CASSIDY

Live Well

The thrill of living goes on and on Out walking on a Sunday

night in the fresh snow.

Tiny flakes, drifting, drifting, drifting down laying a gentle blanket over the already heavy banks of snow.

My wife is marveling at glistening newly-fallen flakes.

When she was a teenager — when I first met her — she had long hair that caught the snow and a knit cap I think her grandmother made.

Now she is a grandmother, her hair is shorter, and yet, her marvel is just as real.

I keep hearing the John Cougar Mellencamp song on the radio, “…life goes on. Long after the thrill of livin’ is gone.”

And while he is a multi-million record/cd seller and I am not, I just can’t agree with his assessment that life is over after those hormone-fired teenage years.

And, neither can the contributors this month to The Good Life.

Take, for example, Maureen Stivers, who told me in an email: “I can’t remember the last time I was this enthusiastic about doing something. It really is incredible.”

Her email came from Japan, where she and her husband were skiing long runs in mostly untracked powder snow. She was so excited, I believe, that she wrote her story, starting on page 10, on her iPhone. Now that’s a snow powder high.

Bev Jagla came into the office last month to collect a few January issues with her story about Starfish Sisters, but immediately whipped out her iPhone where she clicked through her photos, and then stopped: “That’s Mike Leach! He was my seat mate on

a flight from Los Angeles to Seattle.”

Sitting next to a famous person can have its problems: like if you sit there quietly, then you have no story to tell your friends later, but at the same time, you don’t want to look like an idiot to a person who has probably heard more than his share of lame conversations from fans.

For how Bev solved this problem, and more, check out her story on page 7.

I got a tour of Freeman Keller’s guitar-building shop for a story in this issue by Susan Lagsdin. I laughed when I typed that sentence, because while Freeman crafts lovely guitars, his shop is one end of a workbench in an unheated detached garage.

His is likely the smallest shop I’ve visited with Susan, who likes to write about artists and craftsmen.

Hanging from hooks on the garage wall are a couple of racing bikes Freeman built in his earlier days. He said as an engineer, he likes to know how things work, and this has often led him to build-it-himself projects.

Of course, it’s one thing to make a guitar, and another to build the frame of a bike. “I used to race in Ridge-to-River on one of my bikes,” Freeman said, “and when you get to 60 miles an hour on a frame you built yourself, you can worry about how good of a job you did.”

Yes, but when you survive with a story to tell, it’s exhilarating.

By pushing the boundaries of life in big ways and little, the thrill of living goes on — enjoy The Good Life.

— Mike February 2016 | The Good Life

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fun stuff a full LISTING of what to do begins ON PAGE 33

Chickens, Jazz and people of our past: this is February

A night with auctioneer John Curley, seated dinner and dessert and lots of things to bid on.

Wenatchee Convention Center.

Cost: $45. Info: wenatcheehumane.org. Saturday, Feb. 13 from 5:30 – 9 p.m.

Wenatchee Valley Sportsmen Show — See the latest in

outdoor gear, the newest in fishing boats, motors and accessories, the hottest guides and lodges from all over the Northwest, demonstrations, seminar, speaker, casting pool including Lunker Lake where kids fish for free and more. Town Toyota Center. Info: towntoyotacenter. com. Friday through Sunday, Feb. 26-28. Times vary.

A

n old-timer once told us that, “the back of winter is broken by Feb. 10,” but now days, it seems as we locals are poking our heads up earlier in search of good reasons to get out and do.

February is a great month for looking ahead — such as getting ready to raise your own chickens — and for looking back, such as the celebration of People of our Past at the Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center.

Here are a few fun events this month, found from this issue’s What To Do list: Jazznights with the Pros,

followed the next night with

Jazznights with the students — Six professional musicians

from L.A. and New York will perform Thursday, Feb. 4 at 7:30 – 9:30 p.m. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Cost: $10-$24.

Info: 663-ARTS. Students perform after working a week with pros Friday, Feb. 5, 7:30-9:30 p.m. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Cost: $10. Info: 663ARTS. Chicks on Sticks — 8km women’s only event. Proceeds go to The Wellness Place in Wenatchee. Leavenworth Winter Sports Club. Info: skileavenworth.com. Sunday, Feb. 7, 8:30 a.m.

Raising Chickens —Learn the basics from chick to full-

Two nights of jazz: By the pros and then by the students who have been mentored by the pros: Feb. 4 and Feb. 5 at the Numerica Performing Arts Center.

People of our past — Get

to know five real people whose lives contributed to the character of the grown bird. Chicken Wenatchee Valley. coop design considActors portray the erations, protection characters, sharing from predators and short monologues nutrition will be and then answering among the topics covquestions from the ered. Simply Living audience. This year’s Farm, Leavenworth. characters are pilot Cost: free. Info: simClyde Pangborn, plylivingfarm.com. architect Ludwig Sunday, Feb. 7, 3 p.m.

Solberg, trapper GorBird ID skills don Stuart, Shackbuilding — Come town resident Susie along with naturalVickrey and pioneer ist and Land Trust farmwoman Ida conservation fellow Burts. The daytime Susan Ballinger on shows are by donathis bi-monthly outtion. The evening ing for birders of all show includes wine, levels, from beginner Here, chick, chick, chick. Learn the hard-boiled facts about rais- food and live music. to expert. Hone your ing your own chickens, Feb. 7, at the Simply Living Farm.

Wenatchee Valley field ID skills and Museum and Culturlearn to contribute world. Walla Walla Point Park. al Center. Cost: $35, to the online birding tool eBird, Info: cdlandtrust.org. Wednesor $30 for museum members. which lets you track your findday, Feb. 10 at 7:30 a.m. and Info: wenatchee.org. 3 presenings and contribute real data Wednesday, Feb. 24 at 9:45 a.m. tations on Saturday, Feb. 27: 10 used by scientists to monitor a.m. – noon, 2 – 4 p.m. and 6 – 9 bird populations around the Auction for the Animals — p.m.

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My STORY

When Beverly met Mike Being in the presence of someone famous messes with your mind

By Beverly Jagla

I

knew it was going to be a loooong day.

In order to travel from Albuquerque to Seattle and then Wenatchee in a day, I needed to get up at 4 a.m. to get to the airport before 5 a.m. My flight to Los Angeles left at 6 a.m. and then a layover, leaving for Seattle at 10 a.m. One bright spot…

I was upgraded to First Class.

As I settled into my big leather seat, feeling quite smug, I noticed a familiar figure enter the cabin. OMG! I immediately recognized WSU head football coach Mike Leach.

My kids would be so impressed that I flew on the same plane with him! I quickly snuck out my iPhone and snapped a picture to prove that I really had such good luck.

What happened next, is the stuff dreams are made of. He stopped at my row and indicated he was in the seat next to me.

I was totally uncool and said

something like “No way!”

That was probably his first clue that it could be a looong day for him also. Now he was trapped between me and the window for three hours.

My mind began to race. What could I share with him that would let him know I knew something about football? He didn’t have any paperwork or a book with him so I figured he was fair game.

First, I shared that I was sorry about the loss to the Huskies the week before in the Apple Cup. He shared that the Cougars should have won it. Of course, I agreed. I recalled that their quarterback had been out with an injury so I shared that had to be a contributing factor. (One point for me.)

Next, I proved my allegiance to WSU by sharing that my granddaughter had graduated from WSU and was now a doctor in Chicago.

It was his lucky day as I was able to retrieve a picture of her on my iPhone in a Cougar shirt

Beverly Jagla and Mike Leach: What to talk about?

celebrating a recent WSU win with friends in Chicago. He shared that his oldest daughter was a doctor in Atlanta. (Now we were really bonding!)

Next, I shared my son-in-law had been a high school head football coach for many years just to prove that I had some knowledge of the sport. A touchdown is worth six points, right?

It was interesting to watch people as they recognized him.

He got greetings, lots of smiles and comments and one guy volunteered that he had played football at Whitworth.

His responses were always

very gracious and he stated that most people were very nice when they recognized him. I knew they were green with envy that I was sitting there but I played it cool.

Being in the presence of someone famous messes with your mind. I didn’t want to let the opportunity pass without some meaningful dialogue that I could pass on to my family and friends when they asked what we’d talked about.

On the other hand, I didn’t want to be a nuisance.

Hmmmm. What else to share?

}}} Continued on next page

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He may have asked, or perhaps I volunteered, where I was coming from. Here I hit pay dirt.

I told him I’d been outside of Albuquerque working in a school on the Tohajaiilee Indian Reservation. When I asked if he had seen the TV series “Breaking Bad” which was filmed there, he said yes.

Ah ha! He and I had both binge-watched the whole series and discussed the evolution of the characters from ordinary, law-abiding people to drug-dealing criminals when big bucks became easily available.

As I was mentally researching my next topic, a sideways glance revealed that he had fallen asleep. After a while I began to wonder if he was actually playing dead so that I’d leave him alone.

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He slept through lunch but as I ate mine a plan began to form.

He had been on a recruiting expedition and I had a grandson who was a high school senior, starting quarterback for three years and VERY talented; athletically and academically. I knew there was a reason why the travel gods had placed me next to him. Come on… what were the odds? I had even chosen crimson and black clothing for the trip. This was my golden opportunity. I took out a business card from my purse and wrote the necessary information about my grandson on the back.

As we approached Seattle, he woke up so I plucked up my courage, turned and looked him right in the eye and said, “At the risk of being a pushy and inappropriate grandma, I’d like to give you my grandson’s name and information.”

He looked a bit puzzled but took the card. When I told him that several colleges had already contacted him about playing

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February 2016

football there, he perked up. I just couldn’t make up stuff… this was the truth.

He put my card in his pocket and promised to check him out.

Wow! Mission accomplished!

I zipped off the plane and immediately began emailing my good fortune and the picture to my family the flight attendant had taken.

I told my grandson, “as we spoke,” Mike Leach had his name, GPA, high school information and contact information in his pocket. Stunned silence.

“You whaaat?”

Of course it is a long shot but I live by the saying, “Nothing ventured… nothing gained.”

We haven’t heard from WSU yet but they probably have been pretty busy. There were the holidays, the Sun Bowl, and so forth.

We’ll just have to be patient.

Beverly Jagla is the former Eastmont School District Assistant Superintendent. She currently travels nationwide as an educational consultant for a private company.

CROSS CULTURAL YARNS The threads of this story lead to many nations

By Mary Schramm

The world seems small when

you know sheep from Scotland provide wool to make a beautiful rug in Mexico for a Leavenworth woman from Norway.

When our friend, Gro Buer, heard we were traveling to Oaxaca, Mexico, she remembered the 40 skeins of wool she had collected from her pet sheep, Brownie and Abby.

She knew our trip would include a visit to Teotitlan del Valle, the small weaving village a half hour bus ride from the city of Oaxaca.

Perhaps a rug could be woven on the large looms there, using the fleece she had stockpiled.

Would we be willing to stuff the skeins into our backpacks and deliver them to the Gonzales family, one of the many artisans in this village we had visited on a previous trip?

Brownie and Abby, whose ancestors came from the Shetland Islands in Scotland, lived in the Leavenworth area for the past 10 years. The two sheep belonged to Gro, who in 1958 came as a child to the U.S. from Horton, Norway.

Several years ago, when she and her husband, Bruce, moved from Ballard to Leavenworth, a friend gave Gro the sheep, which she adopted as pets. They grazed on acreage next to her home on East Leavenworth Road, moving occasionally from one neighbor’s field to another. These neighbors were happy to graze the sheep in their meadows as companions for their llamas, goats or geese. Brownie’s best friend was a goose.

Once a year, Gro hired a man

to sheer the sheep, trim their hooves and administer medications. She sent the fleece away to be carded, cleaned, spun and plied.

As a weaver, Gro built her own looms and wove blankets from the fleece of the sheep she had grown to love. This year, however, the sheep died and she envisioned using their wool to make a large rug — bigger than her loom could handle — to hang in her home as a reminder of Brownie and Abby.

We took the 40 skeins of precious wool to the state of Oaxaca, and delivered them to the town of Teotitlan. There we handed them to a young woman named Lucy Gonzales who rubbed the yarn between her fingers. “This wonderful quality.” she exclaimed. Then she held a skein up to her nose and smiled. “They will be pleasure to work with.”

This small village is a success story of indigenous Zapotec people who have captured the art of creating beautiful wool rugs.

Teotitlan has about 400 residents whose various talents are incorporated into the process of weaving rugs: the shepherds who raise sheep on their land and sheer the animals, those who card and spin and prepare the yarn, the designers and weavers and those who take the rugs to market.

Most of the wool is dyed, using indigenous plants, flowers, tree bark and insects like cochineal February 2016 | The Good Life

Gro Buer shows off her treasured rug, made in Mexico from the fleece of her pet sheep.

from cactus, to produce the deep, vibrant colors.

The ease with which this is all done is a far cry from the time our family lived on a hilly farm in West Virginia and raised 40 sheep. We were amateur farmers from Washington, D.C. who knew nothing about the animals.

When it came time to sheer them, our teenaged sons were determined to master the art. A neighboring farmer, who came to see the progress, scratched his beard and said, “Looks to me like them sheep done got struck by lightning.”

And my first spinning attempts were a matted mess. The yarn was knotted in places and stretched too thinly in others.

My first weaving was so sad with indented edges and a color www.ncwgoodlife.com

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scheme that didn’t really work. It hangs in a bathroom where it won’t be seen by guests.

Within several months after our visit to Mexico, Gro received her rug via UPS from Teotitlan del Valle, Mexico, 2,500 miles south of Leavenworth. The rug design incorporates geometric figures and diamond shapes in grey, brown, beige and ecru, the natural colors from the fleece of Brownie and Abby.

Now, when Gro turns to look out her window into the meadow, as she did to see Brownie and Abby, her eyes fall instead on the beautiful five-by-eight rug gracing her living room wall. To know part of the wool came from her sheep, the hours it took to make, and the cultures around the world embraced in its creation, make Gro’s rug a piece she treasures as art.

Mary Schramm has lived in Leavenworth for over 20 years, enjoys her writer’s group and is active in the Leavenworth Sustainability Alliance.

ja-pow!

Skiing in japan is a powder-ful experience

By Maureen Stivers

I am out of my mind. Not

in the sense of being mentally unstable, but a state I can best describe as “linguistically incapable.”

This is because for one of the few times in my life, I cannot find adequate words to describe what I did today and how I am feeling this evening. The following nouns are as close as I can come: ecstasy, euphoria and bliss.

So here’s what’s going on.

I am in Japan skiing at a resort on the north island of Hokkaido called Niseko. My day was spent skiing in waist and chest deep, dry, fluffy, mostly untracked powder snow.

Many of you may be thinking “well, I’ve done that,” but it’s

Carl and Maureen Stivers: Japanese culture still exists on the ski hill at this oldest lodge on the mountain. Photo by Shigeo Moriyama TOP: Maureen descends from the peak through meters of dry, fluffy paradise.

“Not an epic day in Niseko, just a day,” she said. Photo by Carl Stivers

just not the same. Any powder enthusiasts who have not heard of this place soon will. For those of you who have, I can tell you firsthand that it is everything it’s cracked up to be.

My husband, Carl, and I watched a video on Universal Sports Network about five years ago showing skiers and snowboarders riding through insane amounts of powder snow,

through deciduous glades, and over fluffy pillows that just never seemed to end. Their ski day was followed by a soak in the onsen, the natural thermal hot springs that are found all over Japan. We vowed to go there as soon as possible.

It has taken us five years of saving and planning to get here and in that short time, Niseko has gone from a sleepy, off-thebeaten-track Japanese ski area to a popular, mostly westernized resort. (This place is crawling with Australians.)

And here is why. Niseko gets an average, and I’m not talking a great year, but an average, of 45 feet of light, dry powder snow every season.

It is called “oceans-effect” snow. Niseko is located on the west side of the island and provides the perfect location for

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Into the great white nothing — on a pizza box

the juxtaposition of cold, Siberian air combined with moisture from the Sea of Japan.

The base area is only at 860 feet and the top of the volcanic peak of Niseko Annupuri is only 4,000 feet. To get the kind of snow they experience here, if one is in the U.S. or Europe, you have to go way up high where oxygen becomes increasingly scarce.

But here, if you’re in decent skiing shape, you can ski and ski and ski without feeling aerobically challenged. Believe me, your legs will be talking to you because the skiing is so great that you just can’t stop yourself.

There are over 600 ski areas in Japan as compared to just over 400 or so in the United States.

And this is a much smaller country. But the thing is, they just don’t boast about it.

From everything we have experienced, the Japanese have been very generous in all ways.

They are more than willing to share their incredible skiing, it’s

just that we Westerners have thought for years that we had the market cornered on the world’s best skiing.

But the truth is, it may be here. Niseko is one of only a handful of ski resorts in Japan with what they call an openboundary policy. At most ski resorts here, you not only have to stay in bounds, but are mostly required to ski on groomed runs.

Niseko is a big exception with nine gates leading to uncontrolled terrain, where the openings and closings are left up to daily decisions made by the ski patrol. If there’s any danger, or if avalanche control needs to be done, the gates are closed. There are severe penalties for ducking ropes or going through closed gates.

Given the rolling terrain and ridges that descend from the summit of the volcano, it is very difficult to see where one is going, and thus, easy to find yourself lost outside the gates.

February 2016 | The Good Life

There is always a bit of apprehension when one takes a chairlift for the first time to the top of a new ski area in poor visibility.

What will it be like getting off the chair? What will really be up there?

Here in Niseko, one first has to get past the means of conveyance.

This contraption was built in 1983 although it appears and feels much older than that. It is reminiscent of the single chair I used to ride at Ski Acres in the late 1960s. Only that one seemed much more sturdy.

The locals call this chairlift “the pizza box.” And it’s obvious why. You sit on a small, square, aging piece of wood that looks like it’s about to break any second. There is no back to speak of, only a round metal bar that wraps around one side and back, about six inches above the seat.

By laying my ski poles across my lap, and wedging their ends under the bar, I was able to lock myself into my seat in case the old lift started swinging and swaying.

Everyone who wants the best snow rides this chair because it’s the only way to gates 3 and 4, which lead to the summit climb and other fabulous backcountry skiing.

We rode it, survived, and rode it again and again and again.

— Maureen Stivers

For this reason, we hired a wonderful guide today named Shigeo. He found us fabulous powder until we were ready to drop.

The highlight of the day was climbing the extra 350 feet, straight up, to the summit from the top of the highest chairlift. We determined through observation and discussions that I was, at nearly 57, the oldest woman making the ascent this morning.

We eventually donned our skis at the top of a long, 35-degree pitch of deep, untracked powder snow. I can say without qualification that this was the most pleasurable descent of my 50 years of skiing.

I’m going to give every powder lover out there a piece of advice: make your plans and come here.

Do what you have to do. Sell one of your cars. Take out a second mortgage. Lie to your boss. www.ncwgoodlife.com

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Feed your children beans and oatmeal if you have to. Just get here as soon as you can. Because pretty soon, the lift lines will be long, the hills will be swarming with people, and untracked will only be an early-morning phenomenon.

I could go on for quite some time about Japan but I’m exhausted so I’m heading off to sleep. I think tonight my dreams will be in white.

When not skiing in Japan, Maureen Stivers lives with her family in Wenatchee.

VW van camping in paradise Family eschews resorts to experience Maui from ‘Stella’

By Eron Drew

E

very fall for the past four years, my husband Willy and I have embarked on a multiweek family road trip with our two kids. It is a chance for us to re-connect as a family through camping and adventuring.

This year, instead of remaining in the Continental United States, we decided to branch out and do our first exotic road trip. Since our kids are now 8 and 6, I wanted to start exploring parts of the world with them that are highly inconvenient/less enjoyable when traveling with toddlers.

For our first airplane-necessary road trip, we decided to explore the Island of Maui in a 1989 pop-up Volkswagen Westfalia camper van.

I’ll preface my story by saying that the trip I am about to describe is not for everyone. If a Hawaiian vacation to you means poolside drinks and over-priced luaus then please don’t attempt our style of vacation. However, if you are comfortable with adventure and the unknown, then this may be the next trip for you.

I first came across the ad for Aloha Campers when I was searching for tent camping options on Maui. We knew we wanted to visit the island but didn’t want to be stuck in one location for the entire trip. We also weren’t interested in visiting Maui for the resort experience.

A vacation for us means the opportunity to see new plants, animals, birds and aquatic life. It also means hiking, sleeping under the stars and (at times) putting ourselves as far away from civilization as possible.

We knew that logistically it was going to be difficult to bring all of our camping gear

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Stella the Van was home away from home; homework station, drying rack and deluxe ocean-side accommodations.

Steel Blue Volkswagen Westfalia pop-up camper van.

Brandon, who owns Aloha Campers, briefly acquainted us with her quirks and showed us the location of several essential features including the jumper cables and an extra screwdriver — just in case.

We threw our packs in the back and prepared for departure. As I was about to turn the key, one of the mechanics knocked on the pasA humid jungle hike led Eron, Ingrid and Leif to this hidden gem of a waterfall senger side window. hiding in the forest above the road to Hana. Photo by Willy Stockman Willy rolled it down and the guy threw us a big smile: “Her name’s Stella,” he shouted with us on an airplane. Renting the Westthrough the window. falia seemed to be the best solution to our We promised to take care of her and problem — enough sleeping space for two headed out in search of a grocery store and adults and two kids, a small fully stocked kitchen and the ultimate freedom to explore. a place to spend the night. We made a quick stop at a local pawnshop and purchased a set This was going to be a great trip. of snorkel gear for $8 and a fishing rod and We landed in Kahului, Maui at 2 p.m. and reel for $25. We were set. caught our shuttle to Kihei where we first Camping on Maui was an interesting expebecame acquainted with our home away rience. Lately, the islands have been getting from home for the next six nights; a 1989 | The Good Life

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February 2016

forests, slogged up a reputation for being muddy trails that un-friendly to tourists. wound beneath wild Although this may be papayas and banyans true if you are touring to hidden waterfalls, around in an uber fast explored freshwater cherry-red mustang caches within ancient convertible or a shiny lava tubes and spotted new Jeep Wrangler, elusive native birds in this isn’t the case when their jungle homes. cruising the island in Willy fished the rugan old Volkswagen ged inlets along the bus that tops out at 50 North Shore and the mph. People love these kids made sand castles vans. from dawn until dusk Even though we with intermittent pausknew we were running es for boogie-boarding the risk of stepping on and snorkeling. We the toes of locals durdined on fresh pineaping our camping trip, ple and star fruit, tiny we found that it was sweet bananas, creamy easy to make friends avocados and sugar when traveling along Look but don’t touch. Nearly every snorkel session was accompanied by a hano — the Hawaiian cane. in Stella. People would Green Sea Turtle.

When it was time to wave, throw us solid return Stella, we were shakkas and made a point to all overcome with sadness. We come over and say “Hi” and have had become attached to our a look inside the van. nomadic life in the van.

We discovered that WestLiving on the beaches of Maui falias are a hot commodity on for that brief period of time was the islands these days. Very few certainly one of the best advenof them still remain in private tures of my life. I am overcome hands. They are a throwback to with happiness that we could a time when surfing and good all enjoy the trip together as a vibes still ruled the island; befamily. fore the mega-resort complexes I am already planning our next became king. vacation.

Who knows what posWe had no trouble backing the sibilities the future holds? But I van in to some prime on-water wouldn’t hesitate to repeat our camping. Often, we were peace- Traveling by camper van allowed the exploration of many of Maui’s North Maui road trip. Indeed, I would fully nestled between old-school Coast beaches not normally visited by tourists. return to van life in a heartbeat surfers who had been living on — and my family would, too. the beach for years. times a playground. and could spend several nights Truly, this trip was amazing Because of the mobility the exploring the more remote areas Eron Drew lives and plays in Leavfrom Day One. We hit up nearly van afforded us, we were able to of Maui. enworth, with her husband and two adventurous kids. every public beach on the island; drive the infamous road to Hana We hiked through bamboo snorkeling two or three times a day in warm, pristine azure waters. We spotted more sea turtles than we could count, saw octopus and eels and more fish than an aquarium can hold.

The only beaches with trash in the sand were those adjacent to the mega resort complexes.

Those beaches also held the least diversity of sea life and the cloudiest waters.

The county beaches set aside for locals were well maintained and uncrowded. They often had showers, bathhouses and someFebruary 2016 | The Good Life

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I also learned the value of wearing a baseball cap. If I bump into something, the bill of the cap hits first...

Do I really have to use that thing?

By Ken Anderson

When I was nine years old, I was diag-

nosed with Type 1 Diabetes.

Twenty-five years later, I began noticing the symptoms of diabetic retinopathy, which started damaging the retina in my eyes. The next 25 years were occupied with attempts to maintain, or salvage, any degree of usable sight I had left. During this period, I had several surgeries, and I experienced many stages of visual impairment.

As my eyesight continued to deteriorate, I had to leave my job as a teacher in the Quincy School District, where I had spent nearly eight terrific years in the wonderful world of kids.

I had to learn how to live, successfully, as a blind man.

I was accepted as a student at the Orienta- Ken Anderson walks through Wenatchee Valley tion and Training Center in Seattle, which Mall, checking his path ahead with his white cane. is part of the Washington State Department of Services for the Blind. We studied braille, It didn’t take long for reality to set in, and cooking, life skills, computers and mobility. whatever dignity I had left dissolved. I had Of course, when considering mobility, you no other recourse than to use the white can’t avoid discussing the dreaded white cane. cane.

My mobility instructor was highly educat-

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ed and trained. She knew that our lives were in her hands, and what we learned from her would have to last us the rest of our lives.

On my first day of mobility instruction, she walked down the hallway toward me with a long white cane in her hand. I thought to myself, “There it is, and here we go.” We talked for several minutes, and she showed me how to hold onto the cane handle, and after a few minutes we walked out of the building and on down the street.

When standing straight up, the cane reached up to my armpit and wasn’t very heavy.

I learned to put my hand holding the cane in the middle of my body, a little above my navel. When the right foot went forward, the cane swung to the left. When the left foot went forward, the cane swung back to the right.

The hand holding the cane must stay in the center of the body.

There’s a reason why I stress that point. I was not careful about keeping my hand in that position. One day, I missed a pole with the cane because my hand was off-center and crashed into the pole face first. I walked away with a split right eyebrow, blood trickling down my face and extremely upset.

I almost made that aluminum cane a decoration around that pole.

As I used the cane, I began to appreciate it more and more. One day, my braille instructor told us about the time she broke her cane and struggled to get to her destination. Her

February 2016

story scared me so much that I started carrying two canes.

I also learned the value of wearing a baseball cap. If I bump into something, the bill of the cap hits first, and I can, hopefully, react by jerking my head back; that is, if I am quick enough.

There are many other challenges. Many times I have been walking on a sidewalk, and the cane has been abruptly stopped by a crack in the concrete. I have then run into the cane handle with my stomach and doubled over in pain. I have even had the cane handle hit me in the face.

At times, the tip of the cane got stuck in the grass along the side of the sidewalk.

One day, we stopped at an intersection along Rainier Avenue in Seattle. I extended my cane to find the edge of the street. I felt something soft in front of me.

I gently hit it a couple of times trying to figure out what it was.

I told my instructor that I could not determine what it was.

Then, a stranger’s voice said to me, “That is my leg.” I was terribly embarrassed, but the man and my instructor just laughed.

Whoa, was I relieved.

This is a good place to discuss one of the serious complications that face some white cane users.

Because the hand holding the cane must stay near the center of the body, there is extreme strain put on the wrist. Actually, the cane user has continual impact-shock and stress on the hand and every joint, all the way to, and including, the shoulder.

As a result, some cane users have suffered from carpel tunnel syndrome. I have had carpel tunnel surgery in both wrists.

When walking with a mobility cane, it is essential to know how to safely cross streets. When

Then, a stranger’s voice said to me, “That is my leg.”

I was terribly embarrassed, but the man and my instructor just laughed. approaching a street the first thing to do is find the edge of the street. I then hold my white cane up toward the street at a 45-degree angle. This alerts the traffic that I need to cross the street.

This gesture is also a request for a favor: “Please stop. Let me cross the street. Thank you!”

When walking in a community, it is essential to know how to safely cross streets. When the street crossing involves an intersection, the challenge is

increased. No two street crossings or intersections are quite the same.

The blind have to comprehend the traffic pattern. Every intersection has its own sound signature, which is how the traffic pattern sounds. I have stood close to an intersection for more than 15 minutes trying to determine the traffic pattern.

After nine months, I left the OTC. I thought that my mobility skills were pretty good, however, when I walked with people who had been using canes for several years, I realized that I was no more than a novice. To become a competent white cane user, the visually impaired user has to be brave, mentally astute, physically fit, and (for me, anyway) just a tad crazy.

As of this writing, the white mobility cane that I once dreaded is now a trusted friend; I carry it wherever I go.

When I returned to teaching, my elementary school students were excited to have me. The

Know of someone stepping off the beaten path in the search for fun and excitement? E-mail us at editor@ncwgoodlife.com February 2016 | The Good Life

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mobility cane had very little effect on them. The boys just wanted to use it for a spear or sword.

The students were more interested in the fact that I was blind.

Sometimes they would put their hands directly in front of my eyes, to see if I were really blind.

Children and young people are very resilient, and people with handicapping conditions are only a curiosity to them.

The only question I got tired of answering was, “Who am I?” In Quincy, 99 percent of the time the question was, “Quien soy?”

At Wenatchee High School, with 2,400 students, the students rushed by and tried to avoid me.

If they came close to me, they just said, “Sorry,” and kept right on going. The wonderful world of kids.

There are hundreds of mobility cane users in the United States. I have just related my own considerations and experiences.

Watching the birds from a kayak Two fun passions combine for a great reason to get outdoors

By Jean Moraga

W

hile it might seem odd to find a love of birding in the seat of a kayak, that’s just how it happened for Cashmere native Sandy Riggleman.

While kayaking off Lopez Island, she noticed a duck with a distinctive tail and face markings sharing her quiet paddle and wanted to know exactly what kind it was.

Having found out that her companion was a long-tailed duck, she decided that the two things — kayaking and birding — went together “pretty darn well.” She’s not sure what caused the eventual obsession but says she knows it was one of the best things that ever happened to

Sandy Riggleman glides across Cooper Lake: Birds congregate around water, making the viewing from her kayak fun.

her.

She had tried a number of other hobbies but none became a passion. While she had always enjoyed the outdoors, now she finds she can’t stay in the house; birding draws her out of the house more and more.

When the stress of work and daily life mount, she takes the kayak out on a lake and that relaxes her. Add to that the chorus of birds and their babies, and, she said, “there’s no way you’re going to go home with stress. It’s

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gone, it’s washed away.” Taking along your dog doesn’t hurt, either.

Doesn’t having a dog along make it harder to bird watch?

Not for Sandy, whose first dog, Chili, had to stay leashed while out, but would also point out birds she might otherwise miss.

She remembers the time there was a pileated woodpecker on a stump, down at eye level, but she didn’t see it until Chili stopped to watch it. Without her curious companion’s sharp

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February 2016

gaze to follow, Sandy would have passed right by, eyes searching the branches and sky above.

Her second dog, Molly, on the other hand, had a different strategy; she would climb into the kayak and settle in for a quiet snooze, while Sandy handled the paddling and searching.

Sandy also recalls taking her own grandchildren with her, spending a few minutes birding, but also watching rivers flow, taking a nature walk and learning a little bit more about the

It’s amazing the variety of birds that can be found just outside, if you’re paying attention, she said. world we live in.

Sandy said there are different mindsets when birding alone and when taking friends along.

When out alone, she’s totally in the moment, focused on the sights and sounds. When taking others birding, she’s there to share what she’s seeing, feeling, hearing. And what one person hears may not be what she hears. She may describe a call as a song, high-pitched and flowing, while a companion may hear the song an octave lower.

The first tip Sandy would give a new birder is that birding is 50 percent looking and 50 percent listening.

This is why wind ruins the fun of birding; calls lost in the wind, a bird sighted, then lost in blown foliage.

Sandy’s tips to getting started include needing only a pair of binoculars and a bird book, such as The Sibley Guide to Birds, for identifying what you find. Then get out of the house or even just open the window and listen.

It’s amazing the variety of birds that can be found just outside, if you’re paying attention, she said.

If you’re in a new area, Sandy suggests you head for a park or a source of water, like sewer ponds, for example. Not the first place a person might think of, but they usually have sandy edges where wading birds can be found. If they are full ponds with cattails growing, there will be ducks, Sandy said.

When out and about, Sandy favors the spiral-bound A.B.A. Lane Guides (published by state.)

The spirals make it easy to keep the guide open to the section she needs. She checks the

Tweeters (http://birding.aba.org/ maillist/WA) site for useful bird information and recent interesting sightings for Washington, as well as a link to a site listing rare bird sightings.

With winter upon us, Sandy said the easiest way to see how many varieties of bird surround you is to get a feeder, or spread some feed on the ground if cats don’t live nearby. The number of feathered visitors that stop by may surprise you, she added.

If the weather permits, visit the Waterville plateau, 27 miles northeast of Wenatchee. Sandy has found that several species — such as Snowy Owls from further north — favor the area in the winter. They are easy to spot from the road, hunting the empty fields or resting on fence posts.

In spring and fall, Sandy spends time in the Columbia Basin, where many birds stop during their migration to rest and feed.

One spot that sticks in her mind sits near O’Sullivan Dam, 15 miles south of Moses Lake.

On one visit she found water levels were unusually low and the birding was amazing, Sandy said.

She met a couple of birders that compared the birding that day to that in Texas, which some consider among the best in the world. Sandy found many birds staying for several days, instead of the normal one-day stop.

She would like to see that more often, the water levels kept low, offering better feeding conditions, to encourage the birds to stay. Birding is enjoyable for both beginners and pros, she said, as well as for entrepreneurs seeking to start a tourism business.

Closer to home is Blackbird Island in Leavenworth, boasting a variety of birds such as woodpeckers, warblers, waxwings, quail, wrens and blackbirds.

With its beautiful mix of trees, water and birds, the experience is, as Sandy said with a smile, “magical.”

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Crater Lake in the off-season: Even colder than expected, but a sight inspiring immense wonder.

Making the best of a

MISSED TURN

By Lance Stegemann

There’s nothing quite like

having one destination and winding up somewhere else completely different.

That’s exactly what happened to my wife Barb and me as we were making our way back from a trip we took to California.

Barb was engrossed in her new book as we headed north, passing towns like Redding, Lamoine, Dunsmuir and Weed. We were on our way back home, but had somehow missed the junction of Highway 97 in Weed.

“This country isn’t looking all too familiar,” I said to Barb alarmingly. “Could you take another look on the GPS and see where we’re at.”

Barb looked at me briefly, then the GPS, then me again. “Uh oh, I think we might have missed our turn,” she said with an air of realization.

Punching in the various towns and routes along the way, we decided we could continue north on I-5 to Medford, then cut over the Cascades to Hwy. 97 on our way north to Bend and then home.

As it turned out, our slight deviation gave us a place where we could go exploring.

We decided to stay in Medford for the night. As I glanced over our map guides, I noticed Crater Lake wasn’t far from the route we would be taking.

“What do you think about going to Crater Lake?” I asked.

“I’ve been there once,” she said, “but it was a long time ago, and in the middle of summer. I wouldn’t mind seeing it again, and I heard it’s really beautiful this time of year.”

I was still a little apprehensive about the road conditions, but by doing some research on the Internet, it appeared everything was still open. That pretty

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much settled it for us; we decided to make the most of our mishap and go visit Crater Lake National Park.

The next morning we got an early start, and the snow kept getting deeper the farther we drove.

We hadn’t seen anyone on the highway for about a half hour, and I was beginning to have my doubts about this detour we were now taking. Finally, a pair of headlights met us as we drove through some thick fog punctuated by enormous trees that seemed to materialize from out of nowhere.

It was a bit unnerving with the limited vision, icy roads and in unfamiliar territory, but we forged on. I was glad to have our emergency kit with us in the event we might find ourselves

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... the snow kept getting deeper the farther we drove. We hadn’t seen anyone on the highway for about a half hour, and I was beginning to have my doubts about this detour we were now taking.

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February 2016

stranded somewhere along the way.

Just as quick as it had appeared, the fog began to lift, and I could see openings where stretches of roadway revealed the painted white lines along either side. A snowplow, with multiple reflective lights, came barreling by, leaving a curl of snow and ice in its wake. I was even more relieved when I saw that

it was dropping sand behind it, and I almost immediately felt my tires grab the road as they gained traction. I looked over at Barb, and she looked back at me.

Neither of us had to say a word, our expressions conveyed the relief we both felt.

Gradually we climbed in elevation. The sun was now starting to peer from out of the east.

It was getting lighter and the views were suddenly all around us. This was what we had hoped for, and it was every bit as stunning as we could have imagined.

The morning sun revealed glittery ice particles as freezing temperatures mixed with cool moist air. Heavy snow clung to limber tree branches as they strained fixed against the weight. We had to squint our eyes momentarily, from the blinding glare that was now piercing through the tree canopy above.

Barb searched frantically for our missing sunglasses, which were now buried somewhere beneath a large pile of assorted items accrued over the course of our three-day road trip.

When we reached the top, we found a place to park, and let ourselves out to investigate the wintry landscape.

It was more than just a little chilly outside and oversized icicles draped in rows along a nearby structure. There was only a slight breeze, but the wind made it feel much colder.

Even with a heavy wool sweater, gloves and hat, I started to shiver almost immediately.

We quickly ducked back into our vehicle and put on something warmer and more suited to the current weather conditions. It looked deceivingly comfortable outside with the blue skies and the sun beating down, but at an elevation of 7,000-plus feet, it was even colder than we were expecting.

Once we were all bundled up, we set out to explore the rim of this giant caldera.

Peering down over the side, we were met by the most ex-

traordinary view. The lake was a brilliant dark blue and in sharp contrast with the steep snowy banks that concealed its whereabouts. Wizard Island stood like a lone beacon amongst the glassy water below.

Barb and I were in awe of the scene before us, despite the stinging breeze that left our faces utterly numb, and both hands buried deep within the comfort of our warm coat pockets.

As we stood in contemplation, I couldn’t help thinking about the incredible cataclysmic events necessary to create such a unique geologic feature. I found myself lost in images of spewing magma, fiery fumaroles, and finally the climax, where failure of the earth’s crust itself collapsed like a cake pulled too early from the oven. The power of nature is some pretty exciting stuff and we were here to witness its design.

After exploring a couple more of the viewpoints, we took one last look and a short hike along the rim, for as far as we dared to venture, in the frigid cold.

We then returned to the warmth and comfort of our vehicle, which was now parked alone in the vacant pullout shrouded by an enormous wall of snow. We had to get going if we were to make it to Bend before dark.

“Well, was it worth getting lost?” Barb asked me cheerfully.

I looked at her with a grin of satisfaction. “Absolutely!” I laughed. “Maybe we should try getting lost a little more often.”

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This big kitchen counter is the heart of the house — Stacy loves to cook and can enjoy a great view across the valley while she’s at it.

and a fringe of timber. It was a wraparound little resting spot, almost anti-view, and surprisingly refreshing to the eye.

The house and outbuildings are situated so that hot summer sun and strong wind are moderated by those western hills, in a kind of banana belt of calm. Big full-grown shade trees also buffer the weather. Wildlife finds its way into view, and resident quail and rabbits, by open-door invitation, bed down in the barn.

When Stacy and her former

HIGH, WIDE AND HANDSOME Story by Susan Lagsdin Photos by Travis Knoop

W

ith all the hillsides, ridges and cliffs throughout the greater Wenatchee Valley, there are lots of view properties. But it takes some serious altitude to claim you have a really pan-

oramic vista.

This house at the steep end of Sleepy Hollow Heights has one.

Straight north, you can look down and across the river to the checkered quilt of orchards edging up to Eagle Rock. To the east you can see Badger Mountain rising far beyond the lights of Wenatchee.

The knockout view is definitely great, but there is serenity too. On a chilly January walkabout, owner Stacy Helton said, “Come on; I want to show you my favorite place,” and she lead the way to the west end up around the guest house to a small plateau near a ravine, facing curves of sage hillside

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February 2016

Stacy gives an extra treat of alfalfa to one of the several registered Quarter Horses she and Sonny keep year-round in their pens and pastures.

High above Sleepy Hollow at the end of the road, the house has plenty of visual privacy as well as friendly neighbors close by, a nice combination.

husband Scott bought the property and built here in 1992, the end-of-the-road location was one of the biggest draws for them. But what mattered even more was the possibility for raising horses on the 10 acres.

Pasture fencing and corrals went in as soon as possible.

Now, Stacy and her long-time partner Sonny Faultner care for several horses (he says eight; she says nine) in several enclosures they’ve constructed. He’s a pro-

fessional roping instructor and horse trainer, so the arena gets good use, with a mechanical steer ready to go in good weather. Two of his best roping horses are blanketed this winter for easy saddling and riding. “For some reason,” Sonny said, looking at our deep snow, “I thought I’d be roping now.”

Stacy is an avid trail rider, and after 24 years she still loves to saddle up and hit the trail — up

}}} Continued on next page

Just a short stroll down from the house, the barn stores hay and gear and offers in this shot a view to the west over sagebrush hillsides.

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Spacious and spare, the master bedroom has its own entrance to the wraparound deck. There are insulating curtains but the wall of glass often stays wide open to the sky.

HIGH, WIDE AND HANDSOME }}} Continued from previous page into the Horse Lake region, over to Devils Canyon above Cashmere, and on a long day out for a ramble on thousands of acres of Wenatchee National Forest. “It’s

been so great to be able to just ride out our back door,” she said.

“It’s all right here.”

Their private driveway winds up between fenced pastures to the 3,000-plus square foot home

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The Heltons built the original house, then realized that guest quarters would enhance the property, so they invested in that addition; it’s been well-used since.

Stacy said that they found a suitable ready-to-go house plan, but she was delighted that the builder (a family member) could easily envision and incorporate changes. “I really wanted high ceilings, and I was surprised how easy it was for them to just lift the roof.”

A tiny room with little function was removed to enhance

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February 2016

the master suite. Small closets were enlarged. The bedroom number was reduced to three, so bedroom size increased. (Stacy said, “When my daughter saw her first college dorm room she wailed, ‘Mom — why’d you give me such a huge bedroom growing up?’”)

Those changes came in the process of construction. But the house has also changed since 1993 for a good reason. “We were young,” Stacy said, “and just growing the business. We had to make kind of mid-grade decisions on some things so we could finish the house.” As their business prospered incrementally, so did the house. Inexpensive carpeting turned to tiles and hardwood floors, bathrooms were stylishly updated, the kitchen took on a lot of good granite.

That kitchen, which was enlarged from the original blueprint, and its big countertop — made a little higher for the

A spacious knotty-pine bonus apartment over the garage, with two entrances, has housed guests and growing children comfortably over the years.

tall people in the family — dominate one side of the living area.

Stacy learned from her grandmother to love cooking and said she’s in her element serving up meals to crowds at a moment’s notice.

The house often fills with friends, neighbors and blended families. Sonny has three grandkids who visit with their parents, and he said, “It’s like a little resort around here every season.

We’ve made a huge ‘slip ‘n’ slide’ for the summer, and in winter that same hill makes great sled-

rain for Sonny and Stacy. After a bout of cancer a few years ago, which is now in remission, Stacy decided to push her retireAnother view of the garage and guest house. A ment date up a secondary driveway circles up in back on the sunny little. western hill side of the structure.

The two are hoping to relocate this ding.” Stacy added, “They even spring to a ranch in Oklahoma come over and jump in piles of where the plan is to work less leaves in the fall.” and play more, continuing their The four-season hill is about horse-raising and riding life to change into more level ternear quality medical care and at

127 Easy St, Wenatchee (509) 662-7722 www.CashmereValleyMortgage.com Division of Cashmere Valley Bank

Unlock your dream home!

Equal Housing Lender, Member FDIC February 2016 | The Good Life

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a quiet country pace.

Stacy has listed the property for sale.

Those 10 high-up acres will have new owners who’ll settle in and enjoy their own particular interests, families or not, horses or not.

But surely they’ll appreciate that it offers so much more than just another pretty view.

Travis Knoop is a former Realtor turned real estate photographer based out of Wenatchee. For more details or examples of his work, visit www.TravisKnoopPhotography.com.

PET tales

Tells us a story about your pet. Submit pet & owner pictures to: editor@ncwgoodlife.com

Ron Watson can be seen

walking Riverfront park with his two dogs Buster, 12, and Maude,11.

Ron said he walks the dogs four times a day. Buster is mixed breed and Maude is a Shih Tzu. He says they are great companions for he and his wife.

And Ron said he never leaves home without his pooper scooper.

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Photo by Michael’s Photography

I

fell in love with Miss Molly when I first saw her face on a pet adoption web site. I knew I needed to rescue her.

That was four years ago.

Since then we have become the perfect match. She will never miss an opportunity for play time (she might be obsessed with toys). I can be sitting on the couch and before too long she has filled my lap with every toy she can find. She waits patiently for me to respond and how could I not give in to a face as sweet as hers?

She is a very spoiled dog, and she deserves it. She brings me joy everyday.

— Joyce Neal

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column GARDEN OF DELIGHTS

bonnie orr

What do you reach for in the kitchen?

I

asked friends to name their favorite kitchen implement. starter for the Instantly, they each no-knead bread said, “Ah that is an easy that I make question!” and then each week. named their most freMy new quently used kitchen tool. favorite is the My friend Flo said that herb scissors she couldn’t live without that Anne gave a small, flat metal scoop, me and I wrote that is labeled as a chopabout a couple per and scoop, but is not of years ago. sharp enough to actually It snips fresh chop anything — but herbs quickly for a scoop — there is and evenly; nothing handier. It is the there is no reaperfect size to move the son not to add garlic, shallots, mushlots of green rooms, etc. from the pungency to chopping board to the dishes all year sizzling olive oil. round. It cuts This scoop is the first not only herbs, present that Flo gave me Knives, measuring cups, chopper, herb scissors, mallet, sieve with handles and more make up a short list but also greens nearly 30 years ago. That of the handiest tools in a kitchen. such as kale for is how important she spring rolls and feels this implement is. never seem to hold enough of an spinach for omelets. I have kept I was amazed how often liquid with decorative handles were edge to safely and cleanly slice a track and found that I use this deemed the most practical to and dry measuring cups were tomato. tool every day. store in the kitchen drawers. mentioned.

My friend Christine told me The sieve with handles that My friend Anne says she canTheir visual difference is that she uses her sturdy old mallet balances on the edge of the sink not live without a kitchen scisthe wet ingredient cups have mostly to flatten chicken breast is the handiest utensil that I sors — especially since so many pouring spouts on them. But own. It leaves both of my hands items are packed in a plasticized into thin, pliable sheets to be the real difference is that the free to maneuver the hot pot of volume of the dry ingredients is covering that is impossible to rip filled with various vegetables and baked.

Astonishingly, it is boiling pasta water. I also sepaopen. based on weight. the handiest tool to smash stale rate sliced veggies from their A good sturdy scissors is also My friends Nina and Adele bread into bread crumbs and to liquid, salt and drain eggplant, essential for cutting up whole said they had to have measurbreak up walnut pieces into finer drain the whey off the farmer’s chickens or trimming fat from ing cups for 1/4, 1/3, ½, 2/3, 3/4 bits. cheese I make. In a pinch I conpork chops. And anyone who and one cup. This is especially Diane said her Kitchenaid vert regular yogurt into Greek important if you are making half even considers borrowing that yogurt by draining off the excess a recipe and must reduce all the pair of scissors from the kitchen mixer is her best friend. It is a 40-year-old machine, and she water. drawer is out of their mind! ingredients by 50 percent. uses it every day.

She uses the To me it is interesting to exKen would agree that great They also suggest running dough hooks, the sausage filler amine vintage kitchen tools. It is knives are the most important a line of red nail polish along and the pasta cutter, so it is par- easy to spot the well-used ones tool — and these have to be the outside of the plastic liquid ticularly useful. that were handled nearly every knives that can be sharpened. measuring cup vertically over This machine is the workhorse day from the time a woman was I am so pleased that he seems the marks denoting the meain a number of my friends’ hous- a bride until she ceased to cook. surement. It is so hard to see the to carry his whet stone and oil es. My machine is also geriatric, every time he comes to visit. A lines on the plastic cups when Bonnie Orr — the dirt diva — cooks made before the flashy colors dull knife is dangerous, and the they are filled with liquid. and gardens in East Wenatchee. were marketed.

Mine mixes the Nesting cups rather than those so-called self-sharpening knives February 2016 | The Good Life

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>>

column moving up to the good life

june darling

This month, every month, love is the answer W

e have a crisis and it is not ISIS, although it may possibly be related.

It is not bullying nor gangs. It is not drug and alcohol misuse; not poverty — lack of housing, food, and jobs. It is not teen pregnancy, poor parenting, not the high divorce rate, not mental illness although all may be related.

The crisis is not the shootings in malls, movie theatres, and schools nor the rash of suicides, not apathy, lack of engagement, and meaningless lives; not obesity, nor poor health — immune system problems, heart disease, and cancer, though all may be related.

The lengthy prologue’s purpose is to get you to take seri-

ously a little four-letter word that is so tragically misunderstood in our society.

We have a crisis (and a solution) in… LOVE. Yes, there is research implicating love-gone-wrong as a probable factor in at least some of the cases mentioned above. But don’t get hung up there.

Can you just agree with me for the moment that love is important for optimal functioning — for individuals, for organizations, for communities and for societies?

First you may want me to be more specific in how I characterize this thing called “love” and that may be the core of where

Jim McVay and Pamela Mullen kiss after saying their tributes. Photo by John Darling

Write for fun and adventure.

Share your story in

METEOR SHOWER TO LIGHT SKY Y EVENTS CALENDAR

COLD RIDE ON DEVIL’S BACKBONE Y EVENTS CALENDAR

WENATCHEE VALLEY’S

NUMBER ONE

WENATCHEE VALLEY’S

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MAGAZINE

April 2015

Open for fun and adventure

WINTERING IN PANAMA Y EVENTS CALENDAR

MAGAZINE

Price: $3

November 2014

Price: $3

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CAVES & CASTLES OF FRANCE Y EVENTS CALENDAR

February 2015

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IN ThE fLOw ON ThE yUKON

SAVOR THE SAGE HILLS

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May 2015 n Cover price: $3

BEING LINCOLN

fickle days, velvet nights

ICONIC WENATCHEE TRAIL SYSTEM OPENS FOR EXPLORING

Passion for 16th president turns into a teaching tool

Skydiving Back to the Old Sod in search of roots

Open the door and fall — a very long way

RUNNiNg wiTh DOgS AGILITY COURSE PUTS OWNERS AND THEIR BEST FRIENDS TO THE TEST

Boating the historic coast of Turkey

Travel Planner Cary Ordway features great NCW getaways

Share your adventure

Life needs a little adventure. Whether you are finding yours around the corner or at the ends of the earth, The Good Life readers want to share in your passion.

Tell us what you are doing and we’ll help you tell a good story.

Suggest an idea

Have you just heard of personal doings from a friend or neighbor that fascinated you? That made you think: “Boy, that would be fun to do”? Drop us an e-mail, and we’ll try to get that story into the pages of The Good Life.

Write for us

We encourage freelance writers to submit ideas and stories. Perhaps the story is about you, or someone you know... help us make The Good Life the local magazine readers eagerly look forward to each month.

Contact us at:

editor@ncwgoodlife.com or sales@ncwgoodlife.com 10 First Street, Suite 108 • Wenatchee, WA 98801

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love goes right or wrong.

True romantic love is NOT intense, burning, sexual desire and passion. Nope, that is infatuation. It feels elating, but is also very fickle and short-lived.

True romantic love is NOT a quest for our one and only soul mate. With this soul mate we will always be blissfully happy, there will be no need to work at loving each other.

What’s a better way, then, to think about love according to respected researchers?

Romantic love, and all love for that matter, is primarily a positive connection.

Positive connection may be shown by listening, sharing intimacy and appreciation. According to researchers, there’s an understanding with happy, in-love couples that they have each other’s backs, that they are committed to each other’s wellbeing.

That may sound like so much blah, blah, blah. Let me give you a real-life example of a couple who dumped mistaken ideas of love and turned toward what they could do to foster their long term positive connection.

My husband, a few hiking buddies, and I met this couple, Pamela Mullen and Jim McVay, on the Indian Creek Trail near the White River Falls. They appeared happy and on a mission.

As it turns out they were on an annual pilgrimage to give their “tributes” to each other.

What?

Tributes are what they call the compositions they wrote to each other when they first married.

I’ve read them. They speak of what they each appreciate in the other, why they are going into this relationship, and specifically how they plan to support each other.

Pam writes, “I love your ability for intimacy, I can talk to you about anything… I have such great respect for how you’ve dealt with the difficulties and challenges in your life — and who you have become because of them… I want to be your encour-

agement, your cheerleader in your successes and challenges.”

Jim writes, “helping comes naturally to you — whether helping a friend, caring for your family, or counseling your clients... We talk whenever anything bothers us and never let a day go by with things left unsaid. You help me laugh when I get discouraged and keep me from taking things too seriously.

The little things you do — like candlelit dinners with soft music playing and your kind words, always from the heart, mean so much to me.”

The annual pilgrimage Pam and Jim make to deliver these tributes to each other involves a beautiful setting (often on the rocks by the White River Falls), a bottle of wine and a little tissue for their tears.

It’s usually done some time near their anniversary. It continues to refresh their love. They don’t expect that love will flourish without work and intention.

Let’s switch now from romantic love and consider a mistaken idea that most of us have about love in general — that love is not for everyone. It belongs to the few and is limited. And that love is tough to give.

Again, no. Love can be done by everyone to anyone all day long.

Dr. Barb Fredrickson is the researcher on this one. Fredrickson says that love develops in those positive micro-moments of connection we get when we do things as simple as making eye contact and sincerely smiling.

These little connections, not only work as a scaffold for building deeper love, but turn out to have a huge impact on our wellbeing.

Fredrickson credits Louis Armstrong with singing of this love years ago in What a Won-

derful World: “I see friends shaking hands, sayin’, “How do you do?”

They’re really sayin’, “I love you.”

We see the world’s many problems. Researchers suggest that positive connection, love, could very well help in reducing them.

We can start with something as big as writing and delivering an annual tribute to our special other and something as small as a handshake or hug to a friend.

Know of someone stepping off the beaten path in the search for fun and excitement? E-mail us at editor@ ncwgoodlife.com February 2016 | The Good Life

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We can choose to offer a smile or greeting to a stranger.

How might you move up to The Good Life by understanding the profound importance of love, letting go of mistaken ideas and being intentional in connecting with others?

June Darling, Ph.D. can be contacted at drjunedarling1@gmail. com; website: www.summitgroupresources.com. Her books, including 7 Giant Steps To The Good Life, can be bought or read for free at Amazon. com.

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column THE TRAVELing DOCTOR

jim brown, m.d.

Alive Inside : Music a balm for Alzheimer’s Almost everyone in their

70s like I am personally knows of friends, relatives or acquaintances who are suffering from Alzheimer’s or advanced dementia, which requires special long-term care.

Unfortunately, Alzheimer’s is all too common. Currently there are 5,300,000 U.S. citizens afflicted with Alzheimer’s with 5.1 million of them over the age of 65. Two-thirds of them are females.

Alzheimer’s is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States and the only case of death in the top 10 that cannot be prevented, cured or slowed. The cost of care for Alzheimer’s now is $226 billion annually and is predicted to be $1.1 trillion by 2050. In Washington state it is estimated that there are 100,000 people with Alzheimer’s, 80 percent of them over age 75. It is the third leading case of death in our state.

To date, even though we know something about the pathophysiology of the damage affecting the brain, we have yet to discover any way to prevent its advancement. It starts in an area of the brain called the hippocampus and seems to spread from there to other parts of the brain.

Recently there have been a number of studies that have shown the positive effect of mu-

(My father) became more and more forgetful until he died at 96... He enjoyed going to church every Sunday as long as possible in his 90s, and I think the music had a bigger impact on him than any sermon ... sic in people with various forms of dementia and in particular Alzheimer’s.

I remember several years ago that some churches went to local assisted living facilities memory units to sing familiar hymns and Christmas music. My first reaction then was what is the point, these people will not respond to that.

Now I know that I was so wrong in my judgment. We now know music is one of the few things that might help those afflicted.

TV talk show host Charlie Rose recently had a brain series and invited many experts to discuss what is known about dementia.

>> RANDOM QUOTE

Take wrong turns. Talk to strangers.

Open unmarked doors. And if you see a group of people in a field, go find out what they are doing. Do things without always knowing how they’ll turn out.

Randall Munroe 28

| The Good Life

It was pointed out that some degree of memory loss is common with aging. For most, it is gradual and mild. It is important to realize this is not dementia or Alzheimer’s.

My father had this in his late 80s and frequently repeated himself and was progressively more forgetful. Despite that, he passed his driver’s license at age 91, which I thought was rather scary. We decided his driving days were over, and he agreed I could sell his car.

He became more and more forgetful until he died at 96, but I never thought his dementia could be labeled as Alzheimer’s.

He enjoyed going to church every Sunday as long as possible in his 90s, and I think the music had a bigger impact on him than any sermon he might have heard, which would quickly be forgotten.

About a year ago, I read in our United Methodist Northwest publication an article titled, Alive Inside. In it a daughter described her mother who had been in an Alzheimer’s unit for a number of years. She visited her frequently, but her mother never said a word and had no apparent emotional response to her visits.

The daughter had heard of the effects of music on people with dementia. One day she brought her iPod and ear buds to the memory unit. She had recorded some music on it from her mother’s era.

When she started to play the music, suddenly her mother started smiling and tapping her feet. It was dramatic. Her mother even started to say a few words for the first time in years.

When the daughter came again, her mother would say “more music.” There now is an organization called, “Alive

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February 2016

Inside” promoting music therapy for people with Alzheimer’s.

A documentary was released in 2014 titled Alive Inside and is available for streaming on Amazon right now. You can watch a trailer of this movie on YouTube as well.

I was moved by the story of an elderly black man who just sat in a chair unresponsive day after day even when he was visited by his family.

One day they started playing some of his favorite music from his younger days. He first started to tap his feet, then move his arms and smile for the first time in years. He then started to speak some.

When asked what music he liked best he said “Cab Callaway.” This is from a man who had not spoken for years. It was miraculous and dramatic.

It seems the music center of our brain can affect in some way many parts of our brain. Appreciation of music does not rely on our cognitive ability. It has been shown the music we remember and enjoyed in our younger years, especially from ages 18-25, might have the greatest impact.

It is hard for me to think in about 50 years, people might come alive listening to today’s rap music — but who knows?

Andy Warhol once said, “Every song has a memory; every song has the ability to make or break your heart, shut down your hearing and open your eyes.”

It certainly seems to do that in many people with dementia.

I have personally witnessed this.

My wife and I and another couple were recently invited to dinner at a friend’s home. We

In my lifetime we put a man on the moon. We need another “moon shot” to find a treatment and cure for this dreadful and costly disease. had known them for over 50 years.

Unfortunately, the wife has been battling progressive memory loss. During the meal she didn’t enter into the conversation. After the meal, her husband said she would play some music for us.

She was a brilliant musician, both harp and piano. We found out she still is. She first played several pieces on the harp. While doing so, she was smiling and talking about the composer and piece she was playing. When she moved to the piano she played by memory and again was smiling, talkative and animated.

I was witnessing a complete transformation. It brought tears to our eyes, and we realized how alive inside she truly is.

We have much to learn about dementia in its various manifestations. In my lifetime we put a man on the moon. We need another “moon shot” to find a treatment and cure for this dreadful and costly disease.

If only we could find funds for such an effort.

As for me, I have about 500 songs in my iPhone that I enjoy and listen to over and over. If the time comes for me, I hope my family remembers to plug me in to my phone.

For more information on music and dementia, go to www.aliveinside.org.

Jim Brown, M.D., is a retired gastroenterologist who has practiced for 38 years in the Wenatchee area. He is a former CEO of the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center.

>>

column the night sky this month

Peter Lind

February’s parade of planets The moon shine early in the morncoming during the first half of pletely February. covers the Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, star south of this line and Venus and Mercury stretch just misses the moon farther across the sky an hour benorth. There is plenty of fore sunrise. Also, thanks information about this event to 2016 being a leap year, on the Internet. we have an extra day this Speaking of the moon, I month to see the string of recently did some reading predawn planets. about the supermoon and This month Neptune is where the term came from. the first visible planet, but I confess, until just a few unless you’re an experiyears ago I had never heard enced stargazer it will be of a “supermoon.”

The average moon of Dec.20, 2010, left, comhard to find, just above As the story goes, astrolopared to the supermoon of March 19, 2011, right, the western horizon as ger Richard Nolle coined as seen from earth. Image by Marco Langbroek of darkness sets in. the term supermoon over 30 the Netherlands via Wikimedia Commons Neptune’s neighbor, years ago. Nolle wrote a defiearth.

Uranus, is a much easier target nition of a supermoon as: “a new Saturn is on the heels of Mars in the night sky. It is about halfor full moon which occurs with this month, popping above the way between the southwestern the moon at or near (within 90 horizon and the zenith (directly eastern horizon around 3 a.m. percent) its closest approach to overhead) in Wenatchee. It is an on the first. On the third, a wan- earth in a given orbit.” ing crescent moon stands just to easy target through binoculars That definition is pretty generwith a magnitude of 5.9. To find the northwest of the gas giant. ous, and why there are so many And finally the two inner it, look for the Great Square of supermoons. There are four to planets, together, slide above the six a year on average, and 2016 Pegasus, lying high in the west, eastern horizon around 4 a.m. like a baseball diamond. has six supermoons. We had a Venus and Mercury stand just The start of the parade of name for these events before a fist’s width apart as they clear morning planets starts with they were called supermoons, the horizon. the king of the planets, Jupiter, they were called a perigee full So, the first half of February shining on the eastern horizon moon. Perigee just means “near provides a beautiful early morn- Earth.” around 9 p.m. local time on the ing view of all five planets from first of the month. It rises about The moon’s elliptical orbit the eastern horizon all the way a half hour earlier each passing around earth means sometimes up past the zenith, and towards week throughout the month. it is closer than other times. The the west. A star chart online will closest point is called perigee. As Jupiter shines about twice as bright as the brightest nighttime show how to find them all. the moon swings farthest away One final event to mention star, Sirius. Be sure to check out once each month, that point is this month happens on the the nightly change in position called apogee. night of Feb. 15/16. of Jupiter’s moons, easily seen Photographs or other instruThe moon occults Aldebathrough any binoculars. ments can tell the difference ran, the first magnitude star in Next to rise is Mars, around 1 between a supermoon and ordiTaurus. Along a line that runs a.m. on the first of the month. nary full moon, to the naked eye through Washington, Oregon The red planet goes through they look the same, although and Idaho, the northern edge of drastic changes this month. sometimes a little bit brighter. the moon grazes across the star.

From our perspective it brightPeter Lind is a local amateur astronThrough a telescope, you will ens by half a magnitude (five omer. He can be reached at ppjl@ be able to see the star disappear times brighter) over the month juno.com. behind mountains and reappear and grows in diameter by 25 percent, as it moves closer to the in the valleys several times.

Five bright planets

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This is a koa resonator guitar. The body is Hawaiian koa wood trimmed in curly maple. “Resonators were developed in the 1930s as the first “amplified” guitars — they were popular with the old bluesmen because they were loud and nasty sounding — perfect for busking on a street corner,” said Freeman Keller. ”Hawaiian players used them for the so called ‘slack key’ music and that seemed to connect with the use of the koa wood.”

Guitar man From a corner of his garage, freeman keller turns out instruments with a clear and full sound

By Susan Lagsdin

Freeman Keller is an ardent,

life-long outdoor athlete with an inquiring mind.

His desire to solve the mystery of “how does it go?” resulted in well-crafted hydroplanes (when he raced boats) and bicycle frames (when he raced bikes.)

One might expect this nowretired engineer/inventor/fix-it guy/woodworker to build his own kayak or skis. Maybe snowshoes? Rock climbing gear?

No. None of the above.

Freeman builds guitars.

He shies from compliments about their beauty, which is

both visual and aural. He is a member of the Guild of Luthiers, but says, “I honestly don’t think I have an ‘art form.’ I just like making things… my only task is to make sound come out of the guitar.”

His much-honed creative skill may have started with a family of artful women surrounding him, or with his own inquisitiveness. The self-labeled geek enjoyed serious play with a chemistry set as a child and provided handmade fireworks displays in his teens. And always there were cars to be fixed and electronics to be fiddled with.

Later, electrical engineering

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Freeman Keller builds guitars in a small corner of his garage.

bachelor’s and master’s degrees and 45 years constantly using them at Alcoa and Van Doren Sales honed his ability to see a problem, analyze it, then seek and find solutions.

Freeman built his first guitar 10 years ago; he’s just now, at 70, starting his 16th. In addition to building for himself or on commission, he repairs (he calls it rehabilitating) abused and derelict guitars for Avalon music. And each time he seeks out the tool, mold or template that could have made the job easier.

He’s also enamored with wood, on which he uses the hand tools inherited from his father and grandfather. “You can see all the wonderful shavings

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February 2016

that result. I really enjoy feeling the way a sharp tool works the wood.”

After playing his factory-built guitar for years, in 2006 Freeman decided to build one from a kit for his grown daughter. That was called a “parlor guitar,” and on it he inlaid a design of her spirit animal, a dragonfly.

That worked so well he built two more almost identical ones, with improvements each time.

And then he started creating Les Paul and Gibson guitars (this interviewer wanted to say “in homage”; Freeman insisted, “They’re knockoffs.”)

Small problems always arise in the building process, beyond the fact that Wenatchee’s humid

“One of the things that I really enjoy about this little game is feeling the way a sharp tool works the wood,” said Freeman. Some of those tools he uses were his father’s and grandfather’s.

A guitar rests among the detritus of Freeman’s workbench. He inlaid a dragonfly into the head of a guitar he made for his daughter, Tina, as it is her spirit animal, then added the same design to a guitar he made for himself.

cold and dry heat in succession are tough on fine woodwork of any kind, and Freeman’s garage/ workshop isn’t climate controlled.

Sometimes the brace work inside needs to be reset, the thickness of the top or back wood needs to be shaved or the length and width of the neck needs to be custom-calibrated.

It’s also hard to know in the course of weeks or months what the final sound will be. Freeman said, “I don’t have much of an ear for music anymore, but I do a lot of tap-tap-tapping on the top as I’m building to make sure the sound is clear and full.”

The finishing work is perhaps the most demanding — the subtle inlay and trim on the edges, rich opulent colors and dazzling shine take specialized sanders, brushes, chisels and exacting precision.

One of Freeman’s own guitars was made from a scrap of Ponderosa pine he found in the old barn at Horse Lake Reserve on a work party. It features a portrait of the barn’s resident horned owl.

Usually, his own initials in mother-of-pearl are the only adornment. But one local player wanted his rock group’s logo inlaid on the top. No problem.

February 2016 | The Good Life

Freeman made this guitar for Jesse Welch, a custom motorcycle painter. Two of his requirements were that Jesse wanted it red and he wanted the skulls inlaid on the neck. (A closer view of the head with an inlaid skull, is below.)

Another asked for death’s head skulls on the neck of a blood-red electric guitar, and although, he said, “It wasn’t exactly my style,” Freeman complied.

Ironically, online photos of that particular instrument lead to a new client and his most challenging project yet — making a left handed guitar to exact style specifications for a man Freeman would never meet.

He and the client, who lived in Vienna, Austria, communicated constantly with photos and scanned templates, emails and phone calls. And a lot of trust.

Freeman said, “The Internet is an amazing resource for learning the ‘how to’ of this — and so are all the people you meet at lutherie conventions — even the masters are eager to tell you their secrets.”

That’s one of the reasons he’s been willing to go public with his quiet, understated enterwww.ncwgoodlife.com

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One of Freeman’s own guitars was made from a scrap of Ponderosa pine he found in the old barn at Horse Lake Reserve... prise.

He knows the recent Wenatchee Maker Faire — where Freeman demonstrated his craft — and this article give him a chance to make connections and said, “I really want people to know that if I can do this, anybody can. And I’d be willing to help anybody get started on their first instrument.”

The Art Life

// SKETCHES OF LOCAL ARTISTS

Collage life As an artist, Lois Pendelton loves to fit together interesting pieces; her life is a bit the same way

By Susan Lagsdin

L

ois Pendleton delights in the design of her decades.

The separate pieces — some serendipitous and some sought out — make a colorful, harmonious collage. “That’s really a good metaphor for my whole life.” She laughed, “I even find myself making collages with the items on the conveyer belt at the grocery store.”

In Seattle, her final job before retirement was annually producing the huge Northwest Flower and Garden Show. One day she realized with life-changing clarity, “I was on the wrong side of the fence — I wanted to design gardens like the ones spotlighted in that show.”

She’d already enrolled briefly in a landscape program at Berkeley, but immediately took more courses to help launch, in 2006, her own garden design business, what she calls her “encore career.”

Lois feels a personal connection to those projects, considering herself a coach to her clients, rather than merely a consultant. Local gardens from Lake Wenatchee to Wenatchee Heights now reflect her artistic vision and her love of natural

materials.

A resume of her career in publication and promotion (at Sunset magazine, Microsoft, GTE, Seattle University, commercial developer Wright Runstad) shows a deliberate pattern of reaching, achieving and starting anew. Lois said, “whenever the systematic and methodical tasks of a job” stopped challenging her creativity, she was ready to re-structure the position or move on.

She was on that work track when five simple words of greeting helped shape the second half of her life. Enthusiastic recognition from a former principal who Lois met at her 25th California high school reunion was a catalyst: “It’s Lois Pendleton, the artist!”

That one assumption that she’d continued with art from her youth helped Lois start into it again, slowly at first, and then with gusto as space and time allowed.

Now, Lois works, or plays, whenever she pleases in her roomy, river-facing upstairs studio in the former Plain vacation

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cabin she and her husband Doug remodeled.

Assiduously segregating tools and materials, she plies her creativity in four distinct (but sometimes overlapping) art forms.

What characterizes them is they are all messy. Each is intensely handlaborious with lots of manipulation of parts, lots of raw material transformed.

No sketches, no paintings, just art made from material with a mind of its own: broken glass, junk metal, old documents, hot wax, powdered pigment, wool fibers, silk remnants.

Her mosaics, patterned from chunks of ceramic or glass shards and local stones, adorn her own walls. One in particular is not just another pretty piece.

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February 2016

A weight-bearing square post at the main kitchen counter was about to be protected with verathane, “And then I thought… hmmm… I can do better than that.” The result was a graceful mosaic aspen tree, counter to ceiling. Way beyond backsplash.

She’s also become adept at encaustic (another art form as ancient as mosaics) using a heat gun and propane torches to heat

>> Lois Pendelton delights in putting small luscious ingredients of all kinds together to complete an artistic vision. Pictured here are the artist herself modeling one of her wool and silk felted garments, her own home’s garden, encaustic and found art, a mosaic plaque, and another whimsical shawl/ jackette.

beeswax and resin infused with pigments. She collages and layers the warm waxy paint with other media, tools and sculpts it, or leaves it bare with a tactile presence that begs to be touched.

Her exploration of “nuno” fabric art, a unique version of felting, has resulted in several stunning jewel-toned, luxuriously soft garments and scarves.

Lois bonds loose wool fibers onto silk gauze with heat, moisture and the constant pressure of hand rolling, sometimes layering them to build up color,

texture, and other design elements.

Recycled materials, mainly metal, intrigue her too.

Rusted doo-dads, scraps and ex-tools are scrounged, stored and ready to grab whenever she embarks on a flight of unconventional found art. One notable gate, a complex triplewide Lois made in tandem with other local artists, graces the entrance to the E. Lorene Young Community Garden in Leavenworth.

There’s something else Lois’s many arts share besides their very tactile and largely unpredictable media. With few exceptions like the above-mentioned gate and a mosaic at the Tierra Village community, they have not been seen by very many people.

These past few years she’s simply exulted in the art-making time and space that retirement affords her, and she says, “It gives me great pleasure to give it all away.”

At this point, there’s no network of galleries or shops, no art fairs or trunk sales or eBay. But, she speculates at approaching 70, “This may be the perfect time to ‘let it all out.’”

Maybe 2016 is the perfect year finally to step into the public eye a bit and to announce that she is indeed “Lois Pendelton, the artist.”

February 2016 | The Good Life

WHAT TO DO

We want to know of fun and interesting local events. Send info to: donna@ncwgoodlife.com

NCW Blues Jam, every second and fourth Tuesday, 7:30 – 11 p.m. Columbia Valley Brewery, 538 Riverside Dr, Wenatchee. Info: facebook. com/NCWBluesJam. Wenatchee Farmers Market, every Saturday, 8 a.m. – 2 p.m. Pybus Public Market.

Weekly Club Runs, every Thursday check in between 4:30 and 6:30 p.m. at Saddle Rock Pub and Brewery. Either a 5k or 10k walk or run on the Apple Capital Recreation Loop Trail. Complete 10 weekly runs and receive a free shirt. Cost: free (other than a smile). Info: Joel Rhyner 387-0051.

2 Left Feet, every Thursday, 7 – 9 p.m. 2 Left Feet is a loose organization of local dance enthusiasts who would like to see more dancing in the Wenatchee Valley. Beginner lesson at the top of the hour followed by carefree social dancing. No partner necessary to join in the fun.

Dance style will be 1940s swing with a bit of salsa, blues, waltz or tango thrown in. Pybus Public Market. Cost: free. Info: pybuspublicmarket.org.

Christmas Lighting Festival, Fridays 4-9 p.m. Saturdays, and Sundays, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m., through the middle of February. Downtown Leavenworth. Cost: free.

Pack Walks, every 4th Sunday at 3 p.m. Bring your friends and dogs on leashes and walk the riverfront trail. Meet on the loop behind Pybus Public Market at the boat launch. Info: wenatcheefido.org.

Stomp, 2/1, 7:30 p.m. An international percussion sensation. Performers make a unique combination of percussion, movement and visual comedy out of household and industrial objects. Town Toyota Center. Info: towntoyotacenter.com.

Pybus University, 2/2, 7 -8 p.m.

Eating for a healthy nervous system and tissue healing will be the topic of this event with instructor Sonia Karumis. Pybus Public Market.

Cost: free. Info: pybuspublicmarket. org.

Film series: Jane Eyre, 2/4, 7 p.m.

Snowy Owl Theater. Cost: $12 or $14 at the door. Info: icicle.org.

Jazznights with the Pros, 2/4, 7:30 – 9:30 p.m. Six professional musicians from L.A. and New York

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will perform. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Cost: $10-$24. Info: 663-ARTS. Jazznights with the students, 2/5 7:30-9:30 p.m. Students perform after working a week with the Pros. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Cost: $10. Info: 663-ARTS. Our People Our Place Exhibit Grand Opening, 2/5, 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. Grand opening of the Wenatchee Valley Museum’s new permanent exhibit exploring Wenatchee/East Wenatchee history. Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center.

First Fridays: n Two Rivers Art Gallery, 2/5, 5 – 8 p.m. Where Land and Water Meet is the featuring works of Jan Cook Mack. Music by harpist Suzanne Grassell. Wines by Gilbert Cellars. Complimentary refreshments. 102 N Columbia, Wenatchee. Cost: free. Info: 2riversgallery.com. n Merriment Party Goods, 2/5, 5 – 8 p.m. Lindsey Harper will showcase her knitted and crocheted hats for children. Snacks and beverages. 23, S Wenatchee Ave. Cost: free. Info: facebook.com/ merrimentpartygoods. n Tumbleweed Bead Co., 2/5, 5-7 p.m. Refreshments served. 105 Palouse St. Cost: free. Info: tumbleweedbeadco.com. n Small Artworks Gallery, 2/5, 5 p.m. Local artists works will be on display at the Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center.

Cost: free. Info: wvmcc.org.

Rocklyn Road band, 2/5, 7 – 9 p.m. Live performance on the concourse. Pybus Public Market. Cost: free. Info: pybuspublicmarket.org.

Have-A-Heart Auction, 2/6, 5 p.m. “A Fairy Tale Ball” is the theme at this silent auction, dinner and live auction event. Beer, wine and a signature drink will be available for purchase. Guests must be 21 years or older. St. Joseph Church’s Kuykendall Hall. Cost: $40 per person or buy a table of 10 for $350.

Last year’s auction raised approximately $100,000, with all proceeds benefiting St. Joseph School. Info: 663-2644.

Mountain music series: Massy Ferguson, 2/6, 6 – 9 p.m. Live music. Hampton Lodge, Mission Ridge. Info: missionridge.com.

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WHAT TO DO

}}} Continued from previous page Film Workshop: Cinematography and video 101, 2/6, 1 – 4 p.m.

Learn about composition, movement and how to make the most of every shot in this hands-on workshop led by Charley Voorhis. Icicle Creek Center for the Arts. Cost: $45. Info: icicle.org.

Chamber music series: Volta Piano Trio, 2/6, 7 p.m. Canyon Wren Recital Hall, Leavenworth.

Info: icicle.org.

Chicks on Sticks, 2/7, 8:30 a.m.

8km women’s only event. Proceeds go to The Wellness Place in Wenatchee. Leavenworth Winter Sports Club. Info: skileavenworth. com.

Raising Chickens, 2/7, 3 p.m.

Learn the basics from chick to fullgrown bird. Chicken coop design considerations, protection from predators and nutrition will be among the topics covered. Simply Living Farm, Leavenworth. Cost: free. Info: simplylivingfarm.com.

Locarno, 2/9, 6:30 p.m. Live performance with Tom Landa and his band. A mix of Mexican folk, Cuban and Latin. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Cost: $10. Info: numericapac.org.

Pybus University, 2/9, 7 – 9 p.m.

Sensory Wine – a blind wine tasting will be the topic of this event with

Coming attractions Feb. 5

instructor Rhett Humphrey of Jones of Washington. Cost: free. Info: pybuspublicmarket.org.

Bird ID skills building, 2/10, 7:30 a.m. and 2/24, 9:45 a.m. Come along with naturalist and Land Trust conservation fellow Susan Ballinger on this bi-monthly outing for birders of all levels, from beginner to expert. Hone your field ID skills and learn to contribute to the online birding tool eBird, which lets you track your findings and contribute real data used by scientists to monitor bird populations around the world. Walla Walla Point Park.

Info: cdlandtrust.org.

Movie on the big screen: Some Like it Hot, 2/10, 6:30 p.m.

Numerica Performing Arts Center.

Cost: $3. Info: numericapac.org.

Film series: Amy, 2/11, 7 p.m. The film is about the tragic and talented Amy Winehouse. Snowy Owl Theater. Cost: $12 or $14 at the door.

Info: icicle.org.

Owl Prowl at Dry Gulch Preserve, 2/12, 6 – 7 p.m. Walk about one mile where you will learn the truth about owls on the Dry Gulch Preserve. RSVP required. Info: cdlandtrust.org.

Mike Bills, 2/12, 7 – 9 p.m. Live performance on the concourse at Pybus Public Market. Cost: free.

Info: pybuspublicmarket.org.

Under the Downtown Lights Prom, 2/12, 7 – 11 p.m. Keepsake prom photo. Corsages and boutonnieres available for purchase at the door. Hors d’oeuvres, desserts and a no host bar, silent auction and much more. Fundraiser for Wenatchee Downtown Association. Cost: $75 per couple. Tickets: wendowntown.org.

Great Backyard Bird Count, 2/13, 9 a.m. – noon. Enjoy a wonderful winter morning at Stormy Creek Preserve and learn about our avian friends in the process. Join biologist and site steward Phil Archibald, where you will learn about the fascinating natural history of the property and contribute to scientific research. RSVP required.

Info: cdlandtrust.org.

Sandy Hackett’s Rat Pack Show, 2/12, 7:30 p.m. Live performance. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Info: numericapac.org.

To advertise your event, contact Sales at sales@ncwgoodlife. com

Living with autoimmunity, 2/13, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m. Seminar open to anyone wanting to learn more about autoimmune diseases and the services available. Numerica

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Performing Arts Center. Cost: free.

Info: Judi Rising 630-5344.

Red Wine and Chocolate, 2/1314, 2/20-21. Various wineries in Chelan pair chocolate with their wines. Info: lakechelanwinevalley. com.

Auction for the Animals, 2/13, 5:30 – 9 p.m. A night with auctioneer John Curley, seated dinner and dessert and lots of things to bid on. Wenatchee Convention Center.

Cost: $45. Info: wenatcheehumane. org.

Wenatchee Valley Symphony Orchestra: Sweetheart Musical Soiree, 2/13, 7 p.m. Wine tasting, premium appetizers and desserts will be served. Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center.

Opera Series: Turandot Encore, 2/14, 2 p.m. Snowy Owl Theater. Cost: $22 or $24 at the door. Info: icicle.org.

FilM series: Why Pacific Lamprey Matter to Columbia Basin Tribes, 2/16, 7 p.m. In this video, tribal members share their feelings on this amazing creature as well as what they are doing to help keep lamprey from going extinct. Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center. Cost: $5 suggested donation. Info: wenatcheevalleymuseum.org.

Pybus university, 2/12, 7 – 8 p.m.

Sugar blues is the topic of this

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February 2016

event with instructor Angie Ploch, a certified integrative health coach.

Pybus Public Market. Cost: free.

Info: pybuspublicmarket.org.

Vida guitar quartet, 2/16, 7:30 p.m. Wenatchee High School auditorium. Tickets: Walt Ness 6708668.

Diabetes Self management workshop, 2/17, 5:30 – 7:30 p.m.

Subjects covered: techniques to deal with the symptoms, healthy eating habits, appropriate use of medication and working more effectively with health care providers. Workshop lasts 6 weeks.

Wenatchee Community Center.

Cost: free. Sign up: 1-800-782-3204 or nilcea@communitychoice.us Ski History, 2/18, 7 p.m. Speaker Bob Stroup will give some history on skiing in Leavenworth beginning with the club in 1928, jumping hills of 1933-1960, downhill and cross country. Upper Valley Museum, Leavenworth. Cost: by donation.

Info: uppervalleymuseum.org.

Film series: Wolfpack, 2/18, 7 p.m. The film is about six teen brothers who find their freedom through film. Snowy Owl Theater.

Cost: $12 or $14 at the door. Info: icicle.org.

The Side Door Band, 2/19, 7 – 9 p.m. Live performance on the concourse at Pybus Public Market.

Cost: free. Info: pybuspublicmarket. org.

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WHAT TO DO

Puppetry Workshop Masterclass, 2/20-21. Puppetry isn’t just for kids. In this two-day session, you’ll work with renowned puppet maker and performer, Brian Kooser, to design, construct and learn to perform with puppets of all sizes.

Icicle Creek Center of the Arts. Info: icicle.org.

Building Healthy Soil and Compost, 2/21, 3 p.m. Any good garden starts with good soil. Learn how to make your own using composting and other techniques. Simply Living Farm, Leavenworth. Info: simplylivingfarm.com.

Pybus University, 2/23, noon.

Matcha: What is it and why is there so much hype about it is the topic with instructors Aubri and Dustin Armitage, owners of Cha Fine Teas.

Pybus Public Market. Cost: free.

Info: pybuspublicmarket.org.

Legislative wake up forum, 2/24, 7 a.m. – 8 p.m. Live video conference with lawmakers at the Capitol Building in Olympia. Ask questions and learn more about important issues facing legislators during this session. Town Toyota Center. Cost: $5 pre-registered or $8 at the door. Info: 662-2116 or jerrilea@wenatchee.org.

Harlem Globetrotters, 2/24, 7 – 10 p.m. A star-studded roster will have fans on the edge of their seats to witness the ball handling wizardry, basketball artistry and oneof-a-kind family entertainment that thrill fans of all ages. Join Globetrotter stars after the game where they will stay for an autograph, photograph and high five session for fans. Town Toyota Center. Info: towntoyotacenter.com.

ping out at 3,350 with an elevation gain/loss of 2,525 vertical feet.

The route is a looped out-and-back, starting and ending at the Lake Wenatchee Rec Club. Info: skileavenworth.com.

The Just Us band, 2/26, 7 – 9 p.m.

Live performance on the concourse at Pybus Public Market. Cost: free.

Info: pybuspubicmarket.org.

People of our past, 2/27, 10 a.m. – noon, 2 – 4 p.m. and 6 – 9 p.m. Get to know five real people whose lives contributed to the character of the Wenatchee Valley. Actors portray the characters, sharing short monologues and then answering questions from the audience. This year’s characters are pilot Clyde Pangborn, architect Ludwig Solberg, trapper Gordon Stuart, Shacktown resident Susie Vickrey and pioneer farmwoman Ida Burts. The daytime shows are by donation. The evening show includes wine, food and live music.

Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center. Cost: $35, or $30 for museum members. Info: wenatchee.org.

Ode to Joy, 2/27, 7 p.m. and 2/28, 4 p.m. Wenatchee Valley Symphony Orchestra and the Columbia Chorale will perform. Numerica Performing Arts Center. Info: numericapac.org.

CASA/ATEEM LadIes event, 2/27, 8 – 11 p.m. Bring your girlfriends and enjoy a night out. Food, adult beverages, dancing, silent auction, balloon pop, photo booth, costume contest and more. Fundraiser for ATEEM, a local mentoring program for foster youth. Pybus Public Market. Cost: $25. Info: cdcasa.org.

Film series: International Fly-fishing Film Fest. 2/25, 7 p.m. IF4 comes to NCW for the first time. A benefit for Wenatchee Valley Fly Fishers Club. Snowy Owl Theater. Info: icicle.org.

Wenatchee Valley Chamber of Commerce Banquet, 3/3, 5:30 - 9 p.m. Lavishly decorated tables, silent auction, no-host bar, raffle, awards and dinner. Town Toyota Center. Cost: $50. Info:

Wenatchee Valley Sportsmen Show, 2/26-28, times vary. See the latest in outdoor gear, the newest in fishing boats, motors and accessories, the hottest guides and lodges from all over the Northwest, demonstrations, seminar, speaker, casting pool including Lunker Lake where kids fish for free and more.

Town Toyota Center. Info: towntoyotacenter.com.

Special Olympics Opening Ceremony, 3/4, 8 p.m. More than 1,500 Special Olympics athletes will represent Washington hometowns. Town Toyota Center. Cost: free. Info: wenatchee.org.

Moose Dewlap Citizen Trek, 2/27, all day. Meadow Creek, Lake Wenatchee. Trek will cover 43k/26 miles of groomed trails beginning at 1,925 feet. elevation and top-

Special Olympics, 3/5, 6. Athletes from across the state will converge on Wenatchee, Mission Ridge Ski Resort and Leavenworth to compete in six sports: Alpine Skiing, Cross Country Skiing, Figure Skating, snowboard and basketball.

Info: speicalolympicswashington. org.

February 2016 | The Good Life

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column those were the days

rod molzahn

Who was Tom Doak, the riverman?

In a 1959 Wenatchee World

interview, Mamie Blair France recalled settling on the Wenatchee Flat in October of 1883. She arrived with her two sisters, parents and a brother, the second white family to claim land in the valley.

Mamie said that when her family got here there were only five white men in the valley: Sam Miller and David Freer at the trading post, Phillip Miller and John Miller on their ranch below Saddlerock — and Tom Doak.

That ignores a few white miners working the river banks in the area and the Tripp family, Tallman, Arzilla and their daughter, Eva, that had settled a year earlier. But just who was Tom Doak?

Doak made his first purchase at the trading post Aug. 8, 1879 and began running up a tab that day, that would keep on growing for eight years.

Over those years he bought food staples including beef, bacon, beans, sugar, flour, small amounts of coffee and lots of tea. To those he added occasional gallons of whisky, tobacco and household items like needles and thread.

He put socks, shirts, pants, boots and shovels on his tab along with acid and quicksilver (mercury.) Both were used in placer mining and he bought nails for building sluice boxes.

He must have been trying his hand along the rivers. Early on he bought a grub hoe to clear land on his homestead.

Tom Doak claimed 160 acres that fronted the Columbia River at the foot of what is now Fifth Street.

He was the first to take land along the river up on the Wenatchee Flat and not at the

confluence. Waterfront property with a view.

In later years it turned out to be prime land, indeed. It’s been the home of the city pumping plant, the first municipal swimming pool and in 1896 the Wenatchee Shipyard, building river steamships for Captain Griggs whose statue stands now in the park on Tom Doak’s land.

Doak worked to clear his land and improve his squatter’s right homestead. And he worked often for Sam Miller at the store.

His bill at the store grew by hundreds of dollars every year.

His payments were paltry.

In August of 1881, Doak bought a boat from the store for $8.38. If you live on the river a boat is good.

Like Ratty said to Mole, “Believe me, Mole, there is nothing as worth doing as messing about in a boat. It’s the finest thing there is, really.”

Tom Doak’s boat was not just for messing about.

For early settlers crossing the Columbia was a constant challenge. The first bridge was still years away.

In the beginning of the 1880s an Indian canoe ferry crossed the river about where the Obadashian Bridge now stands and an Indian woman kept a canoe for hire near the mouth of Stemilt Creek. Settlers called it “The Old Ladies Ferry.”

Tom Doak also offered his skiff for hire. In his journals, Frank Streamer, wanderer and eccentric, noted that on July 1st of 1885 Tom Doak had rowed him across the Columbia to the east side.

In 1887 the riverman married Nellie Curry and they moved into the log house on the riverside homestead. They soon had a child making them part of the group of first white families to

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In August of 1881, Doak bought a boat from the store for $8.38. If you live on the river a boat is good. live in the valley.

In March of 1887 Tom Doak paid off his bill at the Miller/ Freer store. By then he owed $1,097.86. Sam Miller credited him with the entire amount in exchange for 34 months and 20 days of work at the store.

Though Doak continued to live in the valley he never shopped at the store again. That would not have been possible if there had not been another store close by. It’s likely that a Mr. Merriam had opened his trading post by then north of the confluence along the river near the Doak homestead.

In 1885 the Burch family (namesake of Burch Mountain) began operating a steam powered side wheeler ferry just north of the Wenatchee/Columbia Confluence.

Four years later the county refused to renew their ferry license and they were forced to suspend operations. That same year Tom Doak and two partners, Caleb Cooper and Thomas Ingram, were licensed to build and operate a cable ferry from the foot of Orondo Street to east Wenatchee.

Cable ferries, looking much like a barge with side rails, use the current to move them across the river. A steel cable was stretched across the river and over a tall tower on each bank.

The towers were often built

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February 2016

from driftwood trees found along the river with three to five tree trunks taking the shape of a giant teepee. The cable ends were anchored to huge rocks or to trees buried deep in the bank called “deadmen.” Smaller cables and ropes from each end of the ferry were attached by a sliding pulley or ring to the main cable.

A windlass was used to shorten or lengthen the small cables to turn the ferry’s bow at an angle to the current. The force of the current against the angled side of the ferry would move it across the river.

Cable ferries were the most common kind on the upper Columbia and operated at many locations between Rock Island and the Okanogan River.

Cable ferries were not without danger.

Snapping cables, spinning windlasses and drownings were common. Spring floods filled the river with logs and other debris. On one occasion Tom Doak’s ferry was working its way across from then east side with two, four-horse teams and wagons loaded with hogs. About two thirds of the way across, the ferryman noticed that the ferry was moving slowly downstream and realized that one of the “deadmen” anchoring the main cable was pulling out of the ground.

He grabbed the ferry’s bow rope and launched the small skiff from the deck. Rowing furiously with the rope toward the Wenatchee shore he began to shout for help. People gathered quickly and when the skiff reached the bank the crowd all joined in on the rope and pulled the ferry to shore.

The hogs were safe but the

He grabbed the ferry’s bow rope and launched the small skiff from the deck. Rowing furiously with the rope toward the Wenatchee shore he began to shout for help. ferryman complained that the crowd had pulled the ferry so far up the bank that he would need them all back again to put it back in the river.

A different technology prevailed when the first wagon and car bridge across the Columbia (our pedestrian bridge) opened putting the ferries out of business.

Before that, however, Tom Doak sold his interest in the ferry. He also sold his homestead to the Wenatchee Development Company and moved his family to the Okanogan country.

Tom Doak had been an important part of the shift of Wenatchee from a trading post village at the confluence to a growing town on the Wenatchee Flat.

Historian, actor and teacher Rod Molzahn can be reached at shake.speak@frontier.com. His third history CD, Legends & Legacies Vol. III - Stories of Wenatchee and North Central Washington, is now available at the Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center and at other locations throughout the area.

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column ALEX ON WINE

ALEX SALIBY

The wine world swirls round and round First, the sad news, in case

Perhaps the biggest story of all for our NCW wine world is the decision Ray Sandidge recently made.

you hadn’t read, Michael Buckmiller passed away on Dec. 29 of last year.

Those of you who don’t know, Mike was the award winning winemaker for the winery that began as Gold Digger and changed its name to Okanogan Estate Winery. RIP Mike, and thanks for some terrific wines.

Also, the Okanogan Winery’s tasting room in Leavenworth remains open and is tasting and selling the last of the inventory.

The tasting room is on the Front Street level of the building housing A Book for All Seasons on

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Hwy. 2 in Leavenworth.

But enough about sad news, it’s a new year with a great many new adventures happening here in our NCW wine country.

I mentioned earlier, in the January issue, about the new owners of the Voila Winery.

Please take note of the name change to Leony’s Cellars. New proprietors, Sandi and Salvador Moreno are in the same space, using the same equipment that helped Doug Snyder produce his quality wines. Wine tasting and sales continue in the same space that was Voila. The place alone is worth your time to drive out Kimber road for a visit.

The new proprietors will be happy to welcome you and have you sample some of their wares.

As I mentioned in the January issue, you should be able to taste that new Rosé.

Perhaps the biggest story of all for our NCW wine world is the

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decision Ray Sandidge recently made.

First, he’s no longer the winemaker at Lake Chelan Winery (more on that point later on in the column). Even bigger news, Ray and Athena bought some Lake Chelan AVA land and are committed to growing grapes of their own and building a facility in which they will make their own, CR Sandidge wines.

Tasting room for the CRS wines will continue to be at the current Manson location, although, it is possible in the future that special tastings and events may also be offered at the production facility. I’m especially interested attending barrel tastings at the new production location.

Ray also mentioned the new winery production facility will be built over-sized. It will be more than adequate a space and equipment facility to allow for more than the creation of the CRS label wines, and in time accommodate custom-crush wine making for other winemakers in need of the space and equipment.

Here in the Saliby household, we’ve been fans of Ray Sandidge’s wines for more than 25 years. I suppose that ranks as a sort of bias, but it’s a bias of which I’m proud, and I wish Ray and Athena luck in this latest adventure.

The Ray Sandidge change at Lake Chelan Winery, though, affects more than Ray’s life; it affects the Lake Chelan Winery.

I’ve been grateful to Steve and Bobbi Kludt for their decision

to lure Ray to the Lake Chelan AVA from his comfortable residence in Zillah way back then, and I’ve been more than delighted with the Lake Chelan Winery’s wines over these years.

And that’s the important aspect of this change that I’ve been wondering about.

I phoned the winery seeking an answer to who will replace Ray, but at the time of this writing, I’d not yet received an answer. However, I remind myself, it was Steve and Bobbi who built their winery and brought us Ray, so I’m confident they’ll have a solution to this change as well. After all, change is good on several different levels.

However, people, I seem to have forgotten, this is February. February is Red Wine and Chocolate time throughout the land.

Repeating their venue schedules from the past several years, the Lake Chelan AVA will again offer their red wine and chocolate pairings over a two weekend period. Tasting rooms will feature the pairing on Feb. 13 and 14, and again on the next weekend Feb. 20 and 21.

Best of all, the entire NCW region’s wineries participate in this one, so you may taste your favorite red wines in Cashmere, East Wenatchee, Leavenworth, Malaga Springs, Quincy and Wenatchee and your favorite winery, they are all going to be pouring and waiting for you on those Red Wine and Chocolate weekends.

Know of someone stepping off the beaten path in the search for fun and excitement? E-mail us at editor@ ncwgoodlife.com

Alex Saliby is a wine lover who spends far too much time reading about the grapes, the process of making wine and the wines themselves.

He can be contacted at alex39@msn. com.

www.ncwgoodlife.com

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