The Methow Valley, Young at Heart

 
Photo by Joanna Bastian
View of Pipestone Canyon from the Rim Trail. Pipestone Canyon was carved initially by glacial meltwater. Later, the Methow Indians carved  stone from the canyon into pipes and bowls.

Methow Valley News, May 25, 2016

Ever wonder how the Methow Valley was formed?

I am constantly in awe of the beauty of this valley, how the shifting light of morning illuminates the variance in topography, how a rainstorm in the distance cuts a path through a maze of hills and valleys before crashing into the rocky crags of a high mountain peak.

When the warmth of spring melts back the winter snows, I wonder at the sheer number of flowers that bloom, all in different hues and scents: the lupine, balsamroot, Indian paintbrush, wild rose, shooting stars, buttercups, blue bells, and a myriad more whose names I can never remember.

The Methow Valley is geographically young, compared to other areas in the United States. It still bears the recent scars of formation by plate tectonics and glaciers. The Methow Valley is also anthropologically young, as one of the last areas in the country to be settled.

Next Wednesday (June 1), from 7 – 8 p.m. at Sun Mountain Lodge, I will be exploring the formation of the Methow Valley: going all the way back to early beginnings, and how different cultures carved a way of life in this scenic paradise.

I’ll be sharing excerpts from a diary of early fur trappers, early interviews with Indians and settlers, and archaeological evidence left by the first people who lived here 10,000 years ago. I’ll also share some of the experiences I’ve had while writing for the Methow Valley News.

It’s totally free, and I promise to make it entertaining. Where else can you get tectonic plates, glaciers, First People, salmon, fur trappers, European explorers, miners, China Ditch, orchardists, fire and floods all in one hour? Which reminds me of a T-shirt I recently saw in support of keeping the Three Devils Road open: “Because Hell and High Water Do Happen.”

The history presentation was the idea of my boss, Dr. Tom McCord, director of the Bear Fight Institute in Winthrop. The Bear Fight Institute conducts research for space missions, including the Dawn Space Mission, a NASA Discovery Program. Members of the Dawn team will visit the Methow Valley next week for their annual team meeting. As part of the evening’s entertainment, I will be talking about the history of the Methow Valley on June 1. Everyone is welcome to join us.

The following night, Thursday, June 2, from 7 – 8 p.m. at Sun Mountain Lodge, McCord and Dr. Marc Rayman, director and chief engineer of the Dawn Mission, will hold a public presentation about the Dawn Mission and its orbit around Vesta and Ceres, protoplanets from the beginning of the solar system. The presentation will be informative and entertaining, geared towards the general public. It is a perfect opportunity to learn more about our solar system and will offer a chance for budding scientists to ask questions of professionals in the field.

Bee-leiber

Methow Valley News, May 11, 2016

Due to a series of unfortunate events I did not have any bees last year. Long story short: 2014 gave us all a complex, stressing the bees going into winter of 2015, which they did not survive. Ankle reconstruction left me dubious about handling bee boxes while hopping around on one leg. As a result of wildfire, Frankenankle, and disappearing bees, I am just now getting that one part of life back into order.

This year I am trying two different sets of bees: a nuc — which comes with five frames of brood, 10,000 bees and a queen — and a package, which is a box full of bees, no frames, and a queen in a little cage.

The nuc arrived in early April about the same time that the snow melted and the wildflowers began to bloom. The frames easily slid into a waiting hive box and the worker bees downed a bottle of sugar water before setting out to find their own food sources. Within a week they had filled the other frames with comb and required another box. Today, they needed a third box as the second was already filled with nesting baby bees, nectar, pollen and capped honey.

The package arrived on the same day as my cousin Shelby, who flew out from Ohio to visit for a few days.

The package was delayed by a week. That day, I picked up Shelby at the shuttle drop off in Peshastin and apologized profusely that we had to cut our Leavenworth visit short because of my bee addiction. Shelby stopped me with, “Are you kidding me? This will be amazing!” She was thrilled that the bee shipment coincided with her arrival. It’s like we’re related.

After quickly downing a Bavarian lunch of ale, baked pretzels, and smoked salmon drizzled with huckleberry sauce, we returned to the Methow.

At the bee drop-off at the Methow Community Center in Twisp, everyone was true to form: covered in bees and grinning ear to ear.

Shelby also shares my heightened sensitivity to bee stings. We both donned bee jackets for the car ride home with a few “groupies” hanging on to the outside of the package.

At home in the garden, Shelby and I poured the bees into the waiting hive. The bees immediately formed a line at the entrance of the box and fanned their scent into the air, calling everyone home. For the next few days, they spiraled through the air above the hive box, orienting themselves. The buzzing was loud as they communicated where to find water and food with elaborate dances at the hive entrance.

After three days, the bottle of sugar water was fully consumed, and the buzz reduced to a quiet, satisfied hum. The bees no longer flew in spirals. Instead they come and go with a focused determination, some arriving with full pollen buckets of bright orange and yellow. Other bees diligently clean the hive, hauling out bits of trash and the rare dead body. Fascinating creatures.

Backcountry Birthday

Methow Valley News, April 27, 2016

It is a dangerous trip down river with the spring runoff at peak flow this week. The drive itself is dangerous. I’ve pulled over several times to safely observe the flow without drifting into oncoming traffic. I don’t know why I look. The sight fills me with terrible awe. My stomach churns with just as much ferocity as the turbulent water. Whole trees rush by, roots clawing at the air. I wonder if they make it to the ocean in days, or in hours.
Phil Brownlee in Pateros recalls the flood of 1948 whisking a haystack downriver. A rooster perched on top, crowing his discontent.
I met with Rebecca Meadows recently — she said she had something to give me. I expected maybe an old newspaper article, or photos, or maybe some flower bulbs. Instead, it was something even better: stories recorded by her father, Wayne Luft.
The family lived at the mouth of Black Canyon. Wayne led guided horse packing tours through the Sawtooth and Pasayten ranges. In his final years, Wayne made a series of CDs, recording his memories of the early days guiding through hillsides full of flowers, rockslides and high mountain lakes. One of the sweetest memories Wayne shared was that of his daughter’s seventh birthday.
Young Rebecca had asked to ride up to Boiling Lake for her birthday. The family and a few friends loaded up the horses and rode into the Sawtooth range to fish and camp for a week.
At the campfire that first night, Rebecca made the sad observation that this would be her first birthday without a cake. Her father told her he would make it up to her with a triple-decker cake when they got home, but she replied that it just wouldn’t be the same. Here they were with all these people and no cake to share with their friends.
Wayne asked his young daughter if she wanted to lead the group to Cub Creek the next day to fish. Her eyes lit up with the idea of riding in front. After breakfast the following morning, Wayne made an excuse to stay at camp to prepare a big birthday dinner.
When the riders got out of sight, Wayne, his son Pat, and his friend Manual started digging a fire hole to roast the dinner. Legs of lamb were rubbed down with garlic and wrapped in foil with potatoes and onions. Wayne mixed up a cake in a Dutch oven and placed it in the fire pit on top of the lamb. After an hour, Wayne pulled out the Dutch oven and set it on a stump. He dusted off ashes before lifting the lid. The three men held their breath and looked into the oven. Manual declared it the prettiest cake he’d ever seen. The men mixed up a sugar frosting and spread it over the cake.
Late in the afternoon, the fishing crew returned with Rebecca riding tall in the lead, grinning from ear to ear. After dinner, everyone sang happy birthday and the cake was revealed. From the sound of Wayne’s voice on the CD, it is hard to tell which pleased Rebecca the most: leading the fishermen to Cub Creek that morning, or the surprise birthday cake at Boiling Lake that evening. The look on the face of his 7-year-old daughter was something Wayne remembered vividly years later, when he recorded his memories along with all his other “Tales of the Methow.”

Mysterious Footprints

Methow Valley News, April 13, 2016

It was a dark and stormy night.

In truth it was a starlit, clear and cold night, but any good mystery starts off with ominous storm clouds and mysterious footprints.

A group of adventurous Methowites were enjoying a spring skiing trip in a remote area of the Sawtooths when they came across the trail of a mystery snowshoer.

During the last week of March, Dwight Filer, JoAnn Metzler and Sam Greebowich camped and ski-toured the basin below Hoodoo Pass above Lake Chelan. On their first day, Monday, March 28, they came across snowshoe tracks and deduced that someone had recently camped at Boiling Lake. As they toured the area the next morning, they observed the snowshoe tracks leaving Boiling Lake. On the last morning, the group woke up to find footprints of a wolverine that had investigated their tents the night before.

The snowshoe tracks are remarkable in that the area that is so remote and difficult to access. Skis can traverse a snowy landscape in mere hours, compared to snowshoes. The skiers were impressed by the snowshoe tracks and would love to know who might have been enjoying the same stretch of spring snow in the higher elevations.

Photo courtesy of Dwight Filer

JoAnn Metzler and Sam Greebowich on a ski trip into the Sawtooths.

The wolverine tracks were less mysterious and need no explanation. Or do they?

Another mystery readers could help solve is a discouraging case of illegal dumping and polluting.

Within the last month someone dumped a large air conditioning unit in the waters of Gold Creek, two-and-a-half miles up the road, between the South Fork and North Fork bridges. Illegal dumping in state waterways is a criminal offense punishable by a fine.

Just in gas and effort alone, it would have been cheaper for the violators to take that air conditioner to the annual metal drive on April 30.

Dumping in creeks not only destroys the scenery, but also has a negative impact on fish, birds, deer and numerous species of animals who depend on clean water. Less than a mile downstream are numerous family homes with wells that depend on clean ground water for drinking and eating. There are family-owned campgrounds a football throw away from the dumping site. Here, people filter water from the creek for drinking and cooking, cleaning, and their grandchildren enjoy a dip in the cold water.

Further down the creek are beaver ponds, salmon spawning redds, and a community swimming hole. Illegal dumping may be convenient for some, but it hurts everyone else.

If you or someone you know left an air conditioner in Gold Creek, please come pick it up and take it to the Methow Recycles metal drive either Saturday, April 30, or Sunday, May 1, at Cascade Concrete on Horizon Flats Road in Winthrop between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. There is a $15 purging fee for appliances that once contained coolants, like air conditioners. Everything else is free.

Fifteen dollars is cheaper than a criminal record and fine for illegal dumping. Also, the person who retrieves their air conditioner would be giving back to the community instead of taking away the view and the clean water for their neighbors.

Discovery of Long Lost Art is Missing Puzzle Piece

Methow Valley News, March 23, 2016

Photo courtesy of the Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center

Fine art watercolors by pioneer artist Emogene Wells come to light.

Randy Lewis made an important discovery in the art world last month when Linda Melvin delivered five watercolor paintings to his art shop in Seattle: two landscapes and three still-life watercolors of ceramic plates. The early 20th century paintings and the artist, E. Wells, were unknown in the art world.

Linda had found the paintings decades ago at her Aunt Doris’ home in California. At the time of her aunt’s death, Linda was the conservator of the estate and a working mother of two children. The paintings were tucked away and moved with Linda to Seattle. Recently, she rediscovered the paintings and decided to have them framed.

Linda’s sister Susan and brother Robert pieced together the likely route of the paintings. Their father, Gordon Sanderson, worked for A.Z. Wells in Wenatchee during the 1920s and ’30s. Robert worked for A.Z.’s wife, Emogene Wells, as her personal driver. Emogene gave the paintings to Linda’s parents. When they passed away, Gordon’s sister Doris took the paintings to California, and then passed them on to Linda.

Randy Lewis’ family history is also intertwined with the Wells family.

Randy’s great-great-grandmother, Rose Marie Chus-chutl, owned 640 acres along the Columbia River near the Methow Valley. She acquired the land when Chief Moses negotiated individual land allotments for Native Americans as a compromise to the elimination of the Moses Reservation in 1878. Rose-Marie chose the location to preserve the generations of history that were carved into the landscape.

In the early 1900s, Rose Marie verbally agreed to sell 10 acres to A.Z. Unable to read, she trusted A.Z. and signed the written bill of sale. Soon thereafter, workers broke ground on 150 acres, instead of the 10 acres she had thought she sold. A.Z. erected his company town of Azwell and commercial orchards on Rose Marie’s land.

When Rose Marie passed away, her grandson Jerome Miller, Randy’s grandfather, inherited the land. In the 1960s, the Douglas and Chelan County public utility districts began building a dam above Azwell without communicating with Jerome. Behind the newly erected Wells dam, the rising waters of the mighty Columbia River swallowed the homes of Randy’s family. After decades of compromise to keep their heritage intact, it was all under water. For Rose-Marie’s descendants, it was another betrayal in the name of Wells. A.Z. Wells’ orchards and the town of Azwell were untouched.

In the delicate brush strokes of the watercolors, Randy Lewis recognized Tumwater Canyon and Icicle Creek near Leavenworth. He asked Linda if he could research the artist and send copies to the Wenatchee Valley Museum to verify the signature. The ceramic plates in the painting matched the Wells estate plates on display at the museum. “E. Wells” was Emogene.

For Randy, this discovery was a valuable piece to an overall narrative: “Here is a fine accomplished artist in the frontier rush. She was a woman who was ahead of her time and sadly overlooked in 1904. My mother and grandfather told us our whole world is a jigsaw puzzle. Everybody holds a piece. People don’t realize the value of that piece until all the parts come together. Regardless of what happened between our families years ago, our lives are intertwined. To take a piece away diminishes our world, our lives.”

Linda Melvin and her family have agreed to give the original watercolors to the Wenatchee Valley Museum.

Irish Stew and Soda Bread

 March. They say it blows in like a lion and out like a lamb.
So far, March is still roaring like a lion. Rain, snow, flash floods - all this has wrecked havoc in our area, washing out roads and taking down power lines.
Even though the weather has technically warmed up, enough to start the spring thaw, the cold drizzle and winds makes me want to cuddle up with a bottle of wine and a bowl of stew.
This is one of our favorite meals - easy and delicious, filling and warming. Enjoy!

Irish Soda Bread

3 C flour
1 T baking powder
1/3 C sugar
1 t salt
1 t baking soda
1 egg
2 C buttermilk
1/4 C melted butter
Combine ingredients - will be quite sticky. Mound dough onto greased and floured baking sheet or a bare baking stone. Bake at 325° F for 50 minutes. Cool on wire rack.

Guinness Stew

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1 lb beef stew meat, cubed
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1lb yukon potatoes,cubed
• 3 large carrots, chopped
• 6 large garlic cloves, minced
• 32 ounces beef broth
• 1 bottle Guinness
• 1 cup red wine
• 4 oz tomato paste
• 2 tablespoon molasses
• 1 tablespoon dried thyme
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 2 bay leaves
• Salt and Pepper
• frozen veggies: green beans, corn
• chopped fresh parsley

Heat olive oil in heavy large pot over medium-high heat. Lightly salt the beef pieces. Brown the beef without stirring, until browned on one side, then use tongs to turn the pieces over. Continue to cook until all sides are browned, about 5 minutes. Add butter, potatoes, onion and carrots. Sauté vegetables until golden, about 20 minutes.Add garlic and sauté 1 minute. Add beef stock, Guinness, red wine, tomato paste, sugar, thyme, Worcestershire sauce and bay leaves. Stir to combine. Bring mixture to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, then cover and simmer 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

Discard bay leaves before serving.

Cabin Fever Cures

Methow Valley News, March 9, 2016
A receding snowpack forms small rivulets by the porch steps before trickling down the walkway into puddles to become small ponds that burst their pothole dams in a rush to the creek that rolls into the river and onward to the sea.
In the morning I linger on the porch and listen to changing current of the creek — growing ever stronger each day. During afternoon errands I pause in parking lots, just to listen to the rising call of red winged black birds as they sing their joy for longer days of sunshine and freshly opened waterways.
Since early December, I have looked forward to each new post on Nicole Ringgold’s blog, www.LiveInArt.org. She challenged herself to create 30 botanical pieces of art in silver. The results are simply stunning.
In her greenhouse studio inside Twisp’s YardFood, Nicole is surrounded by the inspiring allure of succulents, flowers, herbs, trees, fruits and vegetables. Her first piece of her botanical challenge was a succulent named for its resemblance to a string of pearls. As she nears completion of her botanical challenge, each piece clearly displays Nicole’s dexterous artistry, and eye for delicate detail.
Nicole’s Botanical Challenge blog posts with silvery images of lavender, raspberries and cedar boughs give me a sense of eager anticipation. Her most recent botanical creation last week of western sage sent me out the door in search of early spring trails in the desert.

Photo by Joanna Bastian

Ice Age flood views above the Palouse River are stunning this time of year.

And that, my friends, is how I ended up at Palouse Falls State Park in southern Washington State this last weekend. It was the welcome fix to “cabin fever” with long scenic views, desert birds, and the cleansing scent of sage.
Eight miles downriver from Palouse Falls is Lyons Ferry state park. A trail along the basalt cliffs of the river canyon connects the two parks, and is a section of the much larger proposed Ice Age National Geologic Trail: a network of marked touring trails in the Pacific Northwest.
A stroll in the high mountain desert along an Ice Age trail is not the only fix to cabin fever. Music by the River at Twisp River Suites starts up again this month. Live music and incredibly flavorful meals are the perfect cure to soggy mud-season blues.
After a long winter filled with hearty stews, your taste buds are probably yearning for a light and tangy zest. I found the perfect spring potato salad at Twisp River Suites last spring, and Kori Burwell generously agreed to share her recipe.

Kori’s creamy potato salad with fresh herbs

5 lbs baby red potatoes
5 tbs unseasoned rice vinegar
1 cup mayonnaise
5 green onions, thinly sliced
2 celery stalks with tops
1/2 cup fresh Parsley
1/2 cup fresh Basil
4 tbs fresh dill
zest of 2 lemons
salt and pepper

Steam potatoes until tender. Drain and cool. Cut potatoes into cubes. Place one layer of potatoes in large bowl. Sprinkle with rice wine vinegar, kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper.
Continue layering potatoes and adding vinegar, salt and pepper. Toss with celery, onion, herbs and lemon. Add mayo and toss again. Cover and chill for a couple of hours.