In the summer of 1974 I was 25 years
old and had just finished my third year of teaching. In late June
of that year I embarked on my first truly solo adventure that would,
in the end, define travel for the rest of my life.
I had a one-way ticket from Montreal to
Jasper, Alberta, a wallet full of travelers' checks and a well-worn
copy of an ancient National Geographic article about the
Canadian Rockies.
My father dropped me off at Windsor
Station a few days after the school year ended and at 5:00 pm, on a
late June afternoon, I took off, alone, on the then Canadian
National daily Montreal-Vancouver run.
In 1974 I was a far different traveler
than I am today. I'd packed enough picnic fare—hard boiled eggs,
banana bread, baked chicken—to last me the forty eight hours it
would take to get to Western Canada.
There are many aspects of this trip
that are lost to memory, but what I do remember is that Jasper was my
goal. I'd not really thought much about what I'd do after that, nor
did I give any thought to getting home. I was able to live very much
in the travel moment and not worry too much about what would happen
tomorrow.
I was totally ill-prepared for this
trip. Forty years ago there were not guide books, no blog posts, no
Internet sites. I should have known to bring a warm jacket, but I
didn't. Instead, I had a long sleeve flannel shirt and a thin cotton
hoodie, one pair of jeans and one pair of shorts,
I did have, though, good hiking boots,
warm socks, a fine backpack, a warm sleeping bag and a
more-than-sufficient cook set.
Three days after leaving Montreal I
arrived in Jasper, Alberta. I had a tent, a good sleeping bag and an
open sense of adventure. Somehow, I found a free campsite on the
fringe of town that was located on the banks of a river and loaded
with other young people. A place like that might not exist today.
There were o terrorists roaming the countryside and well all felt
safe. Cities set up places like this for young people. It was a
good time.
There were not facilities, no showers.
Maybe there was a port-a-potty but that another one of those things I
don't remember. All of this was perfectly fine with me. I was 25, it
was the 70's. There was still a residue of hippie in me to embrace
this sort of thing.
I fell in love with Jasper almost
immediately. I bought a hiking guide, hooked up with other hikers,
and spend days and days roaming the trails of Jasper National Park.
Once, with four recently graduated high
school kids, we hiked deep into a nearby valley, pitched out tents on
small islands and in too-fast-running river. It rained. We hunkered
in. Looking back on it, it was such a foolish thing to do. The river
could have flooded and we'd have been washed away.
But we were young and invincible and,
honestly, I don't think any of us even thought of this possibility.
I'm sure “flash flood” had never entered our vocabulary.
We'd seen bears earlier when we'd hiked
other trails. All of us were from urban areas and didn't have a
clue, but we knew enough to let the bears know we were coming. When
we were on the trail the five us, one at a time, would shout...”Stay
away bears!! Stay away bears.” We did this all day long ever four
or five minutes. “Stay away bears!” It probably did the job.
Days later, after leaving these guys,
and hitchhiking to Yoho National Park, I hiked into a gorgeous
mountain lake that still had vestiges of ice on its fringes. It was
early July and weather was perfect. I'd spend my days hiking over
snow fields, climbing to look outs much higher up that where I was
tenting. Mountain goats roamed the steep slopes above me. The days
were brilliantly blue. Often, in the distance, I could hear
avalanches tumbling down summer mountain sides.
I stayed so long in Yoho National park
that I ran out of food. Taking a lead from other hikers, I hiked
down the opposite side I'd ascended, found a resort and begged the
restaurant staff to sell me some food. I came back with eggs, bread
and a few bottles of Pepsi—even then. :)
I have no idea how many days I stayed
in this gorgeous place, but I finally had to force myself away from
the Canadian Rockies. The Summer I was there was simply perfect and
one day rolled into the next-days spent hiking, meeting new people,
enjoying the grand beauty this place had to offer.
From Yoho, I hitch hiked from there to
Vancouver. The journey wasn't direct of course. Because I was always
part of another hiking group and because we were young, our drivers
often invited us to stay in their home. Thus I saw part of Alberta
and BC I'd never have seen otherwise.
I lingered a few days in Vancouver,
sleeping in a youth hostel nearer the beach. It was here that one of
three anti-American sentiments was directed at me. Several of us
were sitting on the beach one evening when a few aggressive, possibly
drunk, Canadians wanted to know where we were from. I was still an
innocent traveller and we told them the USA. They started to pick a
fight, hurled anti-American sentiments at us. Luckily we got left
with no ensuing damage.
After Vancouver I took a boat to
Victoria, where I sailed yet again to Seattle and stayed with our
family friend, Lucille Rabideau who'd moved back to Washington two
years earlier. In Seattle I had a bed and three meals a day and a
roof over my head. It was wonderful.
A few days later I moved on to
Portland, Oregon then hitch hiked to Surf City—many miles to the
west. Surf City, then, was a place of miles long, cold beaches, few
homes and quiet isolation. I imagine it's quite different today.
It was 1974 and there were fewer
regulations in place. I found a sand dune, and set up camp. At
night I'd unroll my sleeping bag, make a “pillow” out of clothes
and snuggle in under the starts. At dawn I'd wake, the sleeping
bag's surface wet with dew. I'd let it dry out, then repack it. I
spent my days roaming the beach, hanging with other young people who
were camped out in the dunes.
I stayed almost a week. Once a day I'd
wander into the local diner and order lunch—and use their bathroom
to take a “shower.” I wasn't so much as dirty as I was salty,
and this once a day bathing was enough to keep me clean. Once I met
a local family who offered to bring me to their home and let me use
their shower. I gladly accepted.
Each day I'd stroll for miles on the
beach. The water was too cold for swimming, but there was plenty to
look at in the water—crabs and starfish. In small eddy's cold
water marine animals made their home.
I'd climb sand dunes that looked like
small mountains. One sand dune was popular for hang gliding and I'd
watch person after person fly off the hill. One woman tried, and
immediately fell, rolling down the dune. An ambulance was called.
She did no move. I've often wondered what happened to her
Evenings were spent around a campfire.
Someone had caught fresh salmon and we cooked it over the open fire.
It was one of the few times in my life when I enjoyed fish.
Twenty years later, in the summer of
1994, Steve and I returned to Surf City. For me it was a journey
back to a place that had meant a lot of me twenty years earlier. We
stayed in a motel. Very little had changed. We walked the beach and
the trails that had been built in the sand dunes. I pondered how I
could possibly have spent week living in my sleeping bag, sleeping in
a sand dune. It was a wonderful journey back to the past.
From Surf City I hitched a ride to the
Highway 1 and almost got arrested doing so—not for hitchhiking, but
for walking on the wrong side of the road.
A State Trooper stopped me.
“Let me see some ID, please.”
Check
“Mr. Ladue, do you realize you're
walking on thew wrong side of the road?”
“But, sir...where I live I'm doing
the right thing.”
“Occupation?”
“Teacher”
“Height?”
“5' 8”, I guess.”
“Weight?”
etc., etc., etc.
I got a warning, in duplicate, which I
still have.
Once on the coastal highway a beat up
old pick up from the 1950's picked me up. On board were a motley crew
of other hitchhikers, all heading south. Everyone smoked pot. The
driver would occasionally get out and ask someone to take over. God
only knows how stoned these drivers were. The things we do when
we're young!
The ride lasted many hours until I got
off in the city of Brookings, on the border of northern California.
Another guy, Mike, got off with me. Together, we found ourselves a
place on the beach, set up camp, prepared meals by night. Each
evening he'd pull out his guitar and other campers would join us.
During the day I'd make my way into
Brookings to “shower” as some restaurant and pick up a few
supplies. Life was extraordinary simple.
We left Brookings, crossed into
California, and hitchhiked south. By now July was coming to an end.
A whole month had passed living in my tent or under the stars. It
had been wonderful.
Mike had been born and raised in LA and
was on his way home to visit family for the summer. We were both 25
and both of us were teachers, we so had a lot in common. He
introduced me to the redwoods, and later to a group of friends living
in Berkley and Davis where we stayed for a few days.
From Davis I flew on to LA for $29.00.
Thank heavens for good travel journal keeping. I'd never know that
figure today.
I knew some folks from the church I was
in Plattsburgh who'd been stationed at the Air Base there and had
relocated back to California.
I stayed with them for about a week,
sleeping on the sofa, being awakened one morning and told to leave
the house because there was an earthquake. I can still see the
entire neighborhood standing in the middle of the street, in their
pj's or underwear.
Their church had a day trip to
Universal Studios and Disneyland and I took advantage of both
opportunities. It was in Glendale, where they lived, that I first
got introduce to Baskin-Robbins ice cream. Everyday I'd walk down to
the shop and bring back enough for all of us.
By now it was getting towards the end
of August and I really had to think about getting home. I'd flown by
the seat of my pants the entire journey and had never really thought
much about the return trip home. But school was going to start in
two weeks and I really had to get back to Plattsburgh.
My LA friend suggested we go to the
airport that night, bags packed, and surf the airlines to see what
was available. Which is what I did. I had a credit card, and bought
a LA—Cincinnati red-eye that stopped in Denver and Chicago. From
Cincinnati I bought another ticket to Albany and then from Albany to
Plattburgh. Imagine trying that today!
From the airport in Plattsburgh I
walked all the way home. I was back “on the road” one last time.
I entered my apartment that had been shut up since I'd left in June.
The daisies I'd picked on a beautiful June day were dried out in a
waterless vase. The paint job I'd started in the kitchen was still
unfinished.
Immediately I went in to trip
withdrawal. All those splendid summer days were now behind me.
School started a week later and life
returned to normal.
For months after I returned I'd show my
slides to anyone who'd sit through them. I did it so often that I'd
memorized my narrative.
Occasionally, in some form of “out
west” nostalgia, I'd pull out my cook stove, sit on the floor of my
living room and cook a typical Summer of 1974 dinner—instant rice
and package of soup mix and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
Sometimes I'd even take out my sleeping bag, place the mattress pad ,
and sleep on the floor.
My journal records names of people I
met, people who's lives transected mine for a short period, people
who came and went that fantastic summer 40 years ago.
Have you had a good life, Robert A.
Oliver? Where are you now Ellen Schaeffer? Did you fulfill your
dreams Paul Wolger? Sadly, my journal barely surfaces the context in
which I knew you, but our time together was good enough for me to
record our time together.
Forty years have passed. I never once
made contact with anyone from my journal, nor I have heard from them.
But all these people life on is what I
learned during that summer—connect, enjoy each other's company,
disconnect, move on. It's the way of travel then and it's the way of
travel now.
What I did learn in that summer so long
ago has held e in good stead in all subsequent travels.
My ability to leave Plattsburgh alone,
navigate new countries, roll with the unexpected, change plans at a
minute's notice and adapt to all sorts of different situations were
all skills I learned, unknowingly then, during that eight week trip.
It was truly a landmark summer--one I
still remember--even more so this summer, its 40th
anniversary. I had traveled to the center of my soul and ht summer
has lingered in a corner of my memory for a very long time.
I will never travel that way again—not
that I can't, but more that I don't want to. What's good for a 25
year isn't necessarily look for a 65 year old.
Still, it's nice to image how easy it
was to sleep in city parks or in sand dunes along the Oregon coast.
I think there is a moment in young
adulthood, or a series of them, when a door opens and the future in.
The Summer of 1974 was one of those
moments.
