The Retasket Motel and RV park turned out to be pretty good. Our site had power and water, and was a few sites away from anybody else. The bathroom – just one for everybody – was clean and weirdly communal. The one room held a single sink, two toilets, two showers, and no interior walls, curtains, stalls or dividers. I wouldn’t want to use it with anyone else but family. We looked the door whenever we went in.

Waking up in the mountains on the 27th, with the sere cliffs surrounding Lilloet offering spectacular vistas in every direction was invigorating. It was a gorgeous day. We laid out our belongings, wet from two days of rain in Golden Ears Provincial Park, in the morning sun. It was necessary, but I always feel so trashy with our things lying all around our trailer. I willed the sun to be hotter.

Those Johnston Kids found an apricot tree with lots of fruit next to our campsite. I offered to make a compote if they wanted to pick some and remove the pits. Excited, they picked a heaping bowlful and shortly thereafter presented me with the pitted mound of fresh fruit. I boiled them with brown sugar, honey and cinnamon until they were soft, and served them with pancakes and ripe plantains. We eat okay.

We wanted to go trail riding, but didn’t know of any ranches. Pulled into the Historic Hat Creek Ranch, north-east of Lilloet on the presumption that a ranch has horses. This one was a preservation of some original ranch buildings and a roadhouse, staffed with people in period dress. They usually had trail rides, we were told, but not this season. Rather than drive around looking for a trail ride and maybe not finding one, we decided to stay and check it out.

There was not so much interesting that I could see. We spent a long time searching for little polished stones in the ‘panning’ area and then took a stagecoach to the native village recreation. That wasn’t bad. Our young native guide was a bit too contemporary, but knowledgeable and I enjoyed our conversation with him. Afterwards, we toured the roadhouse. It reminded me of my grandfather Bill’s house. The scent of old wallpaper and the creaking of wooden floorboards were evocative for me. Back out in the sun, Those Johnston Kids went for ice cream with Alison while I looked for more coloured rocks. It’s mindless I know, but I could do that all day.

We headed south to Kamloops next. We needed to wash Those Johnston Kids’ sleeping bags which had become noticeably gamy smelling. Alison has a fancy new camera and insisted that we stop several times for photo ops. How will we remember if we don’t lsee with our digital eyes?

We found a laundromat in Kamloops, but the skeletal woman there wouldn’t let us wash because she was closing in 45 minutes. She gave us directions to another laundry across town, where the really scuzzy people go. There was a crazy looking homeless man, Carl I think, in the next laundry, doing people’s laundry for a fee. Apparently he washed clothes, just not his own, which were stiff and dirty. He had intimate knowledge of the machines and helped me start the finicky washer. He even knew which year’s coins would be rejected by the change machine. Carl’s long unbrushed hair and gone to dreadlocks, including one that looked like a paddle and seemed to weigh his head down on that side. He wore the tattered remains of sneakers, so ragged they were without soles. The scraps of cloth, black and shiny with street dirt, covered no more than his toes and he kicked them in front of himself like slippers. They couldn’t even be called slippers, though, because they simple didn’t cover any appreciable portion of his foot. Most of his bare foot was on the ground. It seemed like a lot of work to kick around the shoe tatters. I wanted to ask him why he didn’t wash his own clothes or get some kind of footwear, but didn’t. He was pleasant enough when chatting, but clearly listened to some internal voice. I noticed him writing something in pen on a notepad, and stole a peek when he was busy with his laundry contracts. The page was dense with the microscopic writing no more than a millimetre or two high, and he added notes according to some design I didn’t see, filling in random white space on the page with tiny scrawl. Again I wanted to ask, but refrained.

Leaving Kamloops with clean, sweet smelling sleeping bags, we stopped again, again,and  again, for gas, Tim Hortons, and groceries. ‘A few things’ at the Superstore turned into six bags and the scarce empty space in our car was filled with foodstuffs, not unlike how the white space on Carl’s page was filled with minute blue ink observations. Perhaps he was writing a manifesto against consumerism.

It had been a long day on the road, and Those Johnston Kids couldn’t hold on for the last 30 minute ride to the randomly chosen campground, Pinegrove Campground and RV Park. It was full dark when I roused the proprietor to secure a spot. Eschewing the typical campground map with our site circled, he personally lead us to our powered campsite in a golf cart. This was a full-service operation. I was impressed. I have decided that if I ever own a horse I will name it ‘Golf Cart’.

Those Johnston Kids roused just long enough to brush their teeth and fall into plush clean sleeping bags. They were asleep in moments and looked like angels.