Innocents Abroad

Wow, you’d think, after so many years of traveling that we would know better. But no, we embarked on this trip like a couple of complete and total newbies, wet behind the ears like, well, I can think of nothing but dumb and slightly offensive cliches, so let’s just say, wow, have we dorked it up, but good.

First, we totally biffed the packing. I had something decent to wear in the overly air-conditioned halls of the Salem Convention Center, but outside in the 80+ degree weather, I was ill-prepared. I did not pack a pair of shorts and to add to the dorkiness, I had only – oh, this is embarrassing – wool knee socks that I’d intended for wear with my cowboy boots. Doh. Off we went to the clearance store to pick up shorts and sport socks.

Next up, Mr. NEV, aka our hopelessly organized tech support guy, the guy who always packs a dress aloha wear shirt, that guy? Not only did he fail to pack a decent shirt or a pair of shorts, but he plugged the battery charger for his camera in behind the television set in our hotel room. Meaning he did not remember to collect it when we left our hotel room. Meaning we went back to our hotel 24 hours later, biffing our schedule for the day and still not recovering the battery charger because of the Do Not Disturb sign on the door.

But wait, there’s more. After showing up an hour and a half late for our morning appointment, because not only are we badly organized, we are also rude, please forgive us this one time, we headed up into the Mt. Hood National Forest to discover that the route we had selected was — get this — impassable because of snow.

Because we had to backtrack to find a usable route, we were again hours late for our intended destination. The good news was only that we did not have an actual person we were supposed to meet, we were only supposed to report in with an ETA. Our ETA being “Oops, we kind of ran out of road, so, uh, gosh, we’ll be in much later than expected.”

That arrival point happens to be on the lower slopes of Mt. Hood, where I sit now typing and repeatedly checking the forecast. Why? Because in addition to failing to pack shorts, we also failed to pack — wait for it — snow chains. The forecast, according to the nice guy who pulled my beer? Two feet of fresh snow.

There’s nothing in this comedy of errors that has — as of yet — caused us more than a little embarrassment and a minor ding or two on the credit card for about 60 dollars worth of summer attire and possibly again for — wait for it — snow chains. But our collective egos are a little wounded.

We have become, perhaps, a little too cavalier in our “It will be FINE!” manner of traveling. We might consider recovering a little of our common sense. We would do well to pack for all seasons when traveling in the unpredictable northwest. We could remember to always check in at the ranger station before heading into terra incognita. We could not hide critical equipment from ourselves. We could check our itinerary a little more often to make sure we’re not just blowing off appointments. We could check the forecast. We could be a little less dorky, a little less cavalier.

If you don’t hear from us for a few more days, it’s because we’re snowed in. At least we have shorts now. We’ll be FINE!