In between things we went out camping. We had planned to go down toward the Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Adams area, but we pivoted on departure day on account of the record heat. Instead we headed out to the coast, where the record heat was all of 77.
Given our abilities to do only first-come-first-served camping and the tightening of the reservation system in recent years, we headed out to a free, quiet, back-woods Washington Department of Natural Resources campground several unpaved miles off the beaten track. We have camped there happily before. When we arrived after a much-too-long journey with multiple grocery store detours, all nine spots were taken, as well as two additional unofficial spots. However, I knew of another unofficial spot near campsite 1, and we made camp there.
The following morning site 9 had opened up, and we moved so we would have a picnic table and a fire pit. The kids had talked us into s'mores for the first time. We spent the day out at the beach at Kalaloch, and returned in the evening to eat dinner, make s'mores and read a family chapter book in the tent before falling asleep. We did not get to sleep early, as it was July 4, and the fireworks explosions from nearby private lands echoed through the forest until rather late.
Friday, we drove up along the Bogachiel River into the heat and dropped off Jared and E with their supplies for an overnight backpacking adventure into virgin rain forest. Then the two little kids and I hauled out to the wild beach at Rialto and spent a lovely afternoon, cooking our dinner there where we were able to get more water at the Mora campground. The three of us returned to site 9 at Cottonwood around dusk, and I made my very first fire ever and helped the kids make s'mores. We brushed teeth, cleaned up, and packed into the tent for the night. After we read a story, I turned out the lantern and waited for sleep to come. The kids conked right out, but for some reason, I was very awake.
A little after eleven, I heard noisy, deliberate footsteps coming along the gravel road, presumably headed to the outhouse. Very shortly after the footsteps passed our site, they suddenly doubled back, which got my attention. The footsteps then turned and walked into our campsite, right by us in the tent, and now I was on high alert. No longer was I lying in my sleeping bag with my back to the tent flap, trying to go to sleep. I turned around to face the flap, and I sat up with great intensity. There were more unidentified noises in my campsite, and then a sudden loud crash - not a bullet, probably - maybe a metal or glass object being thrown or something bad happening to my car. Directly after the crash, the footsteps ran away and then slowed on the other side od the shrubs. Now I was terrified. I turned on the lantern in the tent and picked up my half-full metal water bottle for a blunt weapon. Laurel woke up, but I was able to convince her to stay quiet, stay down, and stay behind me. If we were going to be invaded, I was going to meet our attacker head on in the front line.
Now a car started cruising slowly around and around and around the circle where we were camped. Maybe it was drunk local kids out looking for thoughtless fun... or this sort of behavior could be predatory. It wasn't worth waiting around to find out, because the wrong decision could be fatal. I realized if these were the wrong campsite invadors, we could die in the next few minutes, and this felt shocking and intense. People disappear under circumstances like these, and their bodies are never found. All our other camping neighbors were in RVs, so I felt extremely vulnerable in a tent. I had 911 cued up on my phone in my left hand and the metal bottle in my right hand. I did not call yet, as I did not want to draw attention to myself by talking into the phone, and I also realized that dispatch could take 45 minutes to get to us out there. I would have to rely on my own actions to save us from possible death, along with whatever unseen forces of good might be sent to help in that dark place in response to my one-word supplication. I was the general and the front line, and I had no team to back me up. I have never once been so terrified or so focussed in my whole life. As the strange car was cruising round and round, the loops were not long, maybe a minute each. I used the far point of one loop to dash out into the dark and quickly inspect my vehicle to make sure it was operable. All four tires looked intact. I returned as quietly as possible to the tent amd quickly packed the essentials into my backpack - wallet, phone, car keys. I was still trying to make a plan. The creepy car cruised by again slowly. What if on one of these rounds they blocked my vehicle in and we had no escape route??? Were these people armed? Was their first invasion of our campsite just a canvassing operation? Were they trying to bait us? On the next far point of the car's loop, I instructed Laurel to dive into the back seat of the car as quickly and quietly as possible, stay unbuckled, and leave the door open behind her. Amazingly, she was able to follow all of these instructions to a T, which I would not typically expect, but it was essential in saving seconds, which was all we had to work with. I flailed, then lifted Lazarus, still asleep in his sleeping bag, and hauled and tossed him into the car behind Laurel, closing the door as quickly and quietly as possible. I dashed back to the tent for my backpack, darted again to our vehicle, threw my bag into the passenger seat, scrambled over it to the driver's seat while pulling the passenger door closed behind me, and pulled out of our campaite as quickly as possible. When I rounded the bend on the loop, the other car was probably 50 feet away and headed towards me. I drove the bumpy, unpaved roads for miles out toward the main highway as quickly as I could. Once we finally reached US 101, I determined that we had not been followed, at least not that far, so I paused to asked Laurel to buckle herself and Lazarus (this is what finally woke him up), and called 911 while I turned north to head for the nearest town of Forks, a 40 minute drive away.
My thought was that Forks had motels, and maybe we could find a place with a locking door where we could spend the night. And if I couldn't sleep while it was dark (likely, given the amount of panic in my nervous system at that moment), they might have a TV the kids could watch the following day while I got some sleep in the light.
Unfortunately every single place in Forks, (and I stopped by them all!) said No Vacancy. Was this because it was a holiday weekend? Or because it was late and all the proprietors had gone to bed? So I decided to head south again.
I thought of trying to pull into the Bogachiel State Park campground, since they should have a host, but they had a sign out front saying Campground Full. Briefly turned up the road that follows the Bogachiel River with the idea we could just wait at the trail head for Jared and E to return. But our designated meeting time was 14 or 15 hours away, and we had no water with us.
So we drove the hour and a half back to Kalaloch in the National Park. There is a nice day-use parking lot, frequented by park rangers and camp hosts, either of whom I would be delighted to talk with in the wee hours. We pulled into a spot around 1:15 am, and I only got out of the car once briefly to "find a shrub". The stars were incredible, and the sound of the ocean lulling. The kids went back to sleep, eventually with Laurel lying on the back seat under a towel and Lazarus reclining in the passenger seat in his sleeping bag. I knew we were safe enough here, but my body was still on high alert, and every little sound and movement sent new rounds of adrenaline coursing through my system, making me feel shakey and nauseous in response. Sleeping was utterly out of the question.
I remembered a night more than twenty years ago when I was at a summer program and watched a horror movie with friends (strictly because I did not have the skills to opt out, which I knew I should do). I spent the rest of the night lying in my bed in the dark, listening to my roommate sleeping, staring at the red light on the smoke detector, shaking at every small wisp of air. This night felt worse, because the danger had been very, very real, but I also knew it would turn out better in the end for the same reason. When the danger had been imaginary, there were no safe actions to take to send it away and calm my nervous system. With real danger, I could work against it to bring us to safety, and no one would look askance if I talked to people to process the experience and get help.
In the late 3:00's the quality of the sky began to change and there were fewer stars. By 5:00, it was light, so I drove us over to one of the campground bathrooms, so Laurel and I could use the facilities. Lazarus rolled over in his sleeping bag, handed me a tooth which had just fallen out of his mouth and went back to sleep. I was exhausted and still not sure what to do. I decided to drive a quarter of a mile down the road and park in front of tbe ranger station, as we had luck getting cell phone service there. I started trying to get ahold of someone safe, because I really needed to talk to an adult. In the end, I had text conversations with my mom in Central time, a dear friend in Eastern time, and eventually a friend in Renton. It was good to talk through what had happened with sympathetic ears, and I ended up napping a non-consecutive 90 minutes or so in the brilliant sunshine pouring into the driver's seat. By the end of the long night in the car, my back was throbbing, but it was far better than being dead. Once the kids were awake, we went back to the Kalaloch parking area and made breakfast at a picnic table. Laurel noticed people getting in line at the ranger booth for first-come-first-serve campsites, and she convinced me to join them. I have never been so relieved to plunk down $25 in my life. After we were done with breakfast, we parked at C-1 and set out a few things in our site, and then went to play on the beach before our Bogachiel rendezvous. I was not ready to go back to get our tent and gear from the previous campground without another adult.
Once we met Jared and E, I had Jared do the driving (something I rarely let him do), because I was so exhausted. We collected our things at Cottonwood, and it felt therapeutic to be there in the daytime and walk the path I imagined for our unwelcome visitor the night before. When we got back to C-1 at Kalaloch, Jared set up the tent, and the kids and I immediately fell into it for a nap in the daylight. Jared woke me up 30 minutes later as orcas had been spotted from the bluff at the edge of the campground. I sprang out of my sleeping bag and ran down the road. Indeed, we saw three orcas spouting and showing their dorsal fins. I had never seen orcas before, and it was a absolutely worth the wake up. After a long watch, I collapsed back into slumber in the tent. When I next awoke, it was evening light out, and Jared had a roaring fire in the grate and an elaborate dinner cooking at the table. It was about the coziest feeling I could imagine, and felt very safe.
I knew that going to sleep in the dark in the tent would be difficult, so I preemptively reorganized our sleeping geometry so that I could be right next to Jared. Indeed, lying in the tent in the dark brought on high alert again, and I was glad of touching "safe skin" in order to calm enough to sleep again.
In fact, it took a week at home before I could go to sleep on my stomach again (my main method of going to sleep for the last year), and when we went back to Kalaloch the following week for two days, I still needed the next-to-Jared sleeping geometry to make it through the go-to-sleep-in-a-tent-in-the-dark hurdle. Sleeping back at home after the second coast trip has been just fine.
