Memorial Day Safari

Last weekend C & I went on a little ceremony-writing excursion into the (mostly) sunny eastern reaches of Washington. In dreaming up the elements of our wedding, we had a lot of help from the creatures we encountered en route-- from the black-headed grosbeaks mobbing a thistleseed feeder by the roaring Tieton River, to a pair of coyotes slinking around the riparian grasslands of the Hanford Reach; from the pre-dawn patter of rainfall in upright Umtanum Canyon, to the splash of Walla Walla red in the tasting room of El Corazon Wines.

On Friday, we left the cloud-strewn city behind and crossed over the soggy Cascades at White Pass, riding the rainbow-painted highway-- blue skies shining up from storm-slick asphalt-- all the way to Walla Walla. There we spent a memorable evening with our good friends Dan & Linda. I've visitied Walla Walla many times, but this was Carmen's first trip-- a necessary pre-nuptial pilgrimage, because Walla Walla is wind and wine country, and Dan & Linda are two of the kindest, most hospitable people on the planet. They married well, ecstatically, many years ago, and we knew we could learn a thing or two from them. So that evening we flipped through books and traded ceremonial ideas-- verse and song-- till nearly midnight, fueled by a damn good bottle of Mr. Owl's Red. Walla Walla wines rank with the best Supertuscans, among others, in my book. The same could be said for Dan & Linda.

Over the next three days, we hopped and shuttled through the sage-steppe and channeled scablands of eastern-central Washington, hiking the trails around Palouse Falls, the Seep Lakes, the White Bluffs of Hanford Reach, and Umtanum Creek Canyon. The weather was fair and breezy-warm, good walking weather, all in all. The birding was excellent. We heard many plausible wedding songs and vows echoing off the basalt cliffs, pouring from the cottonwoods and locust trees: rock wren, yellow warbler, lazuli bunting, yellow-breasted chat. The chat alone knows four poems, at least: rattle, croak, chirrup, and a soft electric one-note bell, al of which it recites in shuffle mode, repeatedly, filling the canyon with exquisite noise. (Complete species list in next post.) We came home to rainy Seattle with an aviary earful, and long shadows stretching over the notebook page.