Lake Powell Part 5 of 10

THE HEAVENS

Everyone

should sleep out under the stars

at least once a year

to be reminded

of the vastness, wondrous beauty

and magnificence

of the universe.

Awesome.

Lofty.

Majestic.

Exalted.

When the wind howled

I yearned for the safety

of my home on solid ground

away from the waves

and scary rocking of the boat

but the next night

secure in my own luxurious bed

I looked up into dark confinement

Sorely missing the wondrous vision

of the galaxies.

Jeanette Hugh, Lake Powell,  7/2/99

OUR 1999 LAKE POWELL ADVENTURE

June 28-July 3, 1999

DeRay, Jeanette, Eddy, Amy, Bonnie, & Melanie

Our daughter, Amy, has put her career on hold

while she works for a wilderness company

helping troubled teens find their way back

by connecting with nature, others, and themselves.

Like the kids she is working with,

she is issued meager rations,

individually cooked in a tin cup

over a fire built without matches,

eating with a hand-carved wooden spoon.

She can make and set traps and find water in a desert

usually cattle troughs

purified with liquid oxygen.

We've been going to Lake Powell

for fifteen years now

She's rarely missed.

But this time was different. . .

very different.

because she was different.

Living so close to nature

and surviving on barren bucolic land

has sharpened her skills

and honed her perceptivity.

She took two friends to Lake Powell with her:

One a friend since her twelfth year

a roommate for five years of college,

the other a new friend whom she

works with at Trefoil Girl Scout Camp

in her spare time.

Bonnie teaches Special Ed in a junior high

while Melanie teaches Biology and Chemistry

in high school.

They planned the menus;

Shopped and cooked all the meals.

Her Pa paid; and worked on the engines

while her Ma and brother Ed simply did the dishes.

It was reverie

after strenuous child-rearing

and homebuilding years.

 

IF YOU FIND A HOOK, GO FISHING

With dental floss for a line

a pole from the Flying Bridge

a dish drainer for a net

and Dutchoven potato for bait.

"I CAUGHT ONE!

I CAUGHT ONE!

IT'S A CATFISH!

I CAN'T BELIEVE WE CAUGHT A CATFISH!"

"What will you name it?"

"Dinner."

The girls put "Dinner" in the dishpan

with the drainer tied securely over him

and weighted him down

in the fresh water marshes

to spend his last afternoon

before dinner.

The three college graduates,

two professional teachers, and one

wandering in the wilderness for six months now,

ended Dinner's earthly existence with a hammer;

gutted him themselves,

and fried him in cornmeal and oil.

DINNER WAS DELICIOUS.

These are women of the nineties.

They do so much more than their mothers ever did.

However, they did squeal and scream

and nearly faint or throw up

while trying to clobber the

wiggly thing to death with a hammer.

And they soaked the hammer and knives

in Clorox water for hours.

Two of them couldn't eat Dinner after all that.

One of them wasn't Amy.

WHEN THE WIND BLOWS, FLY A KITE

But only after you have re-secured the anchors.

A houseboat adrift banging on the shore boulders

is very disquieting.

"Take that anchor up around the big tree

then around the big rock.

That should hold it."

"Are you sure?'

"I don't think I'll sleep much tonight

if the wind doesn't let up,"

said our protector, repairman, and driver.

Ed was too nervous to even

eat any of Aunt Verla's Taco Soup

(He did slurp up the Dutch oven cornbread

and molasses)

even when Bonnie offered to take

him to the new Star Wars Movie

on Monday afternoon if only he would

take three bites.

We all knew he was dying to see it

for the third time.

First Amy fashions a kite out of a black

garbage bag and plastic knives.

It fills with air; she hadn't planned it to be

three-dimensional.

Her second try, she ties four corners

of a plastic bag from Smith's.

It soars high above the cliffs,

tugging and dancing to delight

any kite enthusiast.

We bought Batman and other

inventive kites in Mexico

solely to take to Lake Powell.

We forgot them.

Fortuitously.

There's something visionary,

even spiritual,

about flying a "kite"

with dental floss

after the boat is secure.

Jeanette Hugh, July 4, 1999

Hugh History (bare facts): Left at 10:50 pm for Lake Powell.  Amy drove to pick up Melanie at 107th South in Salt Lake.  Bonnie drove to Spanish; I drove to Price; DeRay drove to Lake Powell turn off.  I drove on it arriving at 5:15 AM.  Unloaded.  I went back to bed for an hour.  DeRay never did.  He worked on the engines.

At 9:30 AM, we went to the store and were sailing by 10:30 AM.  The girls pretty much slept until then.  Then they slept while we traveled.  No use taking them sightseeing.  Our contract is for them to do all the cooking and we do all the dishes.  They planned the menus and went grocery shopping.  French toast for breakfast.  Everyone is on own for lunch.  We had a great swim after we got anchored.  We had to drive another houseboat off our cove – and hope no more come in.  After all, squatters rights; we’ve been here at least three years now.  Ed got so hot in the bathroom, he was glad to get in the water.  This is the first time we’ve ever been in July and it isn’t even July yet.  It’s hotter and busier this time of year.  The girls fixed a delicious Dutch oven dinner including Dutch oven biscuits.  We ate out on the beach. Smart thinking to use Dutch ovens rather than cook in an already overheated boat.  We had another nice swim while the dinner cooked – until we heard the dinner bell.  The boat really isn’t driveable.  The steering doesn’t work; one engine doesn’t work.  We’re further away now than we should be.

Awake at 6:45 w/sun hitting us hard.  Came down to a layer of bugs over table, seats, wall and ceiling.  We decided to not turn the lights on again.  “You know something, Mom, family vacations are the pits.  Like the one we’re on now,” Ed says sincerely. Isn’t this great?  We’re already hot & miserable.  Think of all we’ve got to look forward to today!  We learned to dip often – delightful swims, games, snacks, chips and dips; Dutch oven pizza.  “You want to know something, Mom, I’m glad we came on this trip.”  I did the dishes by candlelight.  Romantic, huh?  Finding a hook in the lake, the girls have taken up fishing.

Now it’s July. I reached my goal before 8:30 AM.  Pretty good, huh?  My goal was swimming across the bay from rock to boat.  Its 10:45 and we still haven’t had breakfast.  Fishing has distracted them.  Melanie caught a big one that got away.  More ingenuity – the dish drainer for a net.  DeRay worked on the engines all morning.  Ed didn’t want to swim before breakfast.  He didn’t know breakfast would be at noon.  It’s calm.  It’s beautiful.  Lying topside last night, we connected with the universe – an essential at least yearly for mental health and proper placement in the scheme of things.  It has to be where there is no fear.  I told DeRay I wasn’t going to sleep until I saw a satellite or shooting star.  We saw both.  Ah, the wonders of the Universe.  Amy caught a fish at 12:37 PM – A CATFISH, using dental floss for line, the brace from the Bimby top for a pole; a triple hook they found in the lake; a dish drainer for the net; and Dutch oven potatoes for bait.  “I can’t believe I caught a catfish!” Amy kept saying.  They kept the fish pleasantly alive in the dishpan with the drainer tied on top in a secure cove in the shallow part of the lake.  Then when dinnertime came, they killed it with a hammer, gutted it and cooked it.  IT WAS DELICIOUS.  We also had grilled hamburgers and enjoyed our dinner in the top deck dining room with the massive kaleidoscopic stone walls and the heavens for a ceiling.  Dishes by candlelight again.  The moon came up an hour later so the stars were brighter and more numerous; the Milky Way prominent; the vastness and beauty wondrous.The wind blew all night making us restless, fearfull.  At one time the sky was completely covered with clouds.

Swim & bathe early; hotcakes.  We pulled anchor around noon after the girls swam.  We found a lovely cove across from Halls Crossing.  The Wind picked up and finally broke our anchor loose; it actually shattered the rocks we had it around.  Then when DeRay started the engine to control the boat that had blown into the rocks, the engine overheated.  After securing the anchors, Amy and Melanie flew a kite.  It sure beats fretting to death like Ed & I have a tendency to do.  For dinner we had Aunt Verla’s taco soup and corn bread cooked in the Dutch oven but Ed was too nervous to eat.  The bright side:  We could turn on the lights because the bugs evidently are not windbound creatures.  The wind didn’t let up until after we went to bed after midnight.  Ed slept inside.

When I stepped over the girls to start the motor when DeRay was working on them early Saturday morning, I noted that Amy had tied a string on the corner of her blanket to the boat.  She is so “prepared” and resourceful.   We dumped and filled; got gas, had breakfast and was off the boat by 10 AM when DeRay was supposed to meet Lonnie.  Lonnie hadn’t come by 11:15 so we locked it up and left.  We got almost to Green River before the van crapped out on us.  We spent five hours and $426 but we have a new fuel pump and are very glad to have found a mechanic.  We arrived home at midnight after dropping Melanie off in Salt Lake and Bonnie at her doorstep.  Dad & Brent visited until 3 AM.  Dad was totally hyped over the van troubles and the boat troubles.  He loves to resolve them.