We meant to go camping but the camping wasn’t meant to be. Saturday, a comedy of errors.

Dithering meant a late disembarkation. We had to return to the house an unprecedented three times for forgotten items. Then there was driving, driving out east on Wash. SR-14. A failed foray towards a hot springs on the Wind River. Starvation turned us across the river to The Dalles. Time trailing away in an unremarkable Mexican restaurant with a surly waiter, instead of exploration.

A quick stop in the Columbia Hills Preserve and a stare at the view, but we couldn’t tarry; must be to Maryhill Winery before it closed and then find a camping spot. Harried tasting at Maryhill, rush off. Down to Maryhill State Park, where David wasn’t satisfied with the camping arrangements because it was RV-heavy and exposed, but agreed to stay.

We sat by the Columbia River and I sorted rocks. It should be illuminating that this was the best part of my day. So many rocks, all river-rounded, all complex. Where did they all come from? Flat, round rocks with veins of things and a shallow translucence like they had two skins. Perfect skipping rocks, though I am too graceless to skip them well. Rocks with green specks and red lines, rocks that looked better wet. It made me want to get a rock tumbler. It made me want to bone up on geology.

I stumbled back towards our campsite (foot-deep river rocks hard to walk through) and took a photo of a copse of unidentified trees. Strangely the only photograph I took on our “trip.”

At the campsite David had camp chairs set out and a beer. It was sunny and perfect, only the slightest suggestion of a breeze (no tortuous, typical Columbia Gorge squall-wind). We supposed now that the sun was getting low we should set up the tent we’d borrowed from our friend Carl (don’t get me wrong: there are multiple tents owned in our household, but none large enough for our new queen-sized air-bed–Carl’s was reputably huge).

We unfurled it on the grass, all dusty from its previous use at Burning Man, and suddenly David looked stricken.

“No poles,” he said.

We scrabbled frantically through its storage bag. No poles, anywhere. We sat back down in the camp chairs and stared at the opposite side of the river. A few trains went by. Finally, we packed everything back up, put the river-damp dog in the hatch, and drove towards home.

We detoured via Goldendale along the Klickitat river through its eponymous, creepy, dead-mill, polluted-weird town. Home by solid darkfall, but weary from being carbound and cooped on such a solitarily perfect spring day. David made a campfire in our yard. I came out and sat by it with the camping lantern for reading by but there was poisonous rhododendron ash raining into my glass of Syrah and it was hard to see my book (Lewis & Clark’s original journals). I went inside and felt headachy and read the first act of Julius Caesar and fell asleep.

I’ve had more productive days.