24 hours, that is. My visit to Eaton Natural Beef Ranch provided just the fresh wind I needed in my sails. I arrived to their guest cabin (you can rent it too!) about 5pm to the inviting smell of pot roast, prepared and ready on the counter for my dinner. The boys & I unpacked, adjusted to our new surroundings (no cell, no email), took a quick bio-break, and hunkered in for the evening. Me, the pot roast, the NY Times (I must have been in a mood, because Al Gore’s Op-Ed piece got me riled up enough to draft a response!); the boys, some chow and a good snooze.
The morning was mellow and easy in our cozy one-room abode. Then, I hopped in the van with my fabulous host Nikki and toured the Ranch and some of the surrounding Wawawai Canyon (she tells me you say it like Hawaii, but with a ‘W’ at the beginning). Happy cattle for the most part, except for the moms and babes that were recently separated 
Fed some, cleaned up after some, and listened to stories about how they raise their animals.
For the afternoon, they had plans and showed me where to take a great hike with Clark & Lewis. We lucked out and had a rainless sky and took full advantage, huffin’ and puffin’ straight up one side of the canyon. It was awesome, a 360 degree view of the canyon and the Snake River. Every direction I turned I saw Kathrine Nelson charcoals.
Wawawai Canyon
starting up
- coming down
autumn sunflower
Returned to the cabin for leftover pot roast, mixed up a nice cup of cocoa and read all of Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. Loved it!
Cleaned up, packed up, enjoyed one more conversation with Nikki (and let me tell you… what a cool woman… I could talk to her for a lifetime) and put the boys and myself in the Outback. A dark clear sky out in the Palouse, the Big Dipper hung right on the horizon straight in front of me all the way home.
