Good Life May 2012

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Contents

page 13

making a connection in Tanzania Features

7 run, joel, run

Joel Rhyner has been running for joy since middle school and now is promoting events so others can get in stride

10 sharing music

Whether it’s a jazz “conversation” or sweet singing in the choir, having others join in makes music a lot more interesting

16 FICKLE PATAGONIA

The spectacular scenery at the bottom of South America is sometimes stark and stunning, and other times familiar

22 between a rock and the river

Jan and Tom Short love to show people around — and see their surprising reactions Columns & Departments 18 June Darling: Sage advice on how to live longer 26 Alex Saliby: Temperature matters with wine 28 Bonnie Orr: Recipes from Belize 29 The traveling doctor: Is screening a good idea?

31-35 Arts & Entertainment & a Dan McConnell cartoon 36 History: First whites came for fur and the flag 38 Tweets from the bush: ‘Hey, ladies, here I am!’

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editor’s notes

MIKE CASSIDY

What’s been your best day since ’07?

Sometimes, your significant

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other can be your best friend.

Other times, he or she can be a pin pricking your bubble.

“Hey,” I said to her recently, “The Good Life is turning five years old this June. Let’s have a contest where we ask readers to tell us a story about the best day of their lives in the past five years. Maybe we can even give away a prize.”

“Last five years?” she asked.

And perhaps thinking of the Great Recession and its associated woes, she added: “What good has happened to you in the past five years?”

I was taken back. Was she right, had nothing good happened in the past five years?

“Well…” I drawed out, stalling for time, “how about the day we bought our boat? Or, better yet, the day we sold our boat? Or the day our last child finished college and got out of our checkbook? Or when grandson Collin was born? Or…” “You’re right,” she interrupted, brightening into the “best friend” mode, “we have had a lot of good things happen to us in the past five years. That’s a good idea for a contest.”

And so, here we go.

The rules are simple: Think of a good day you have had in the past five years, and send us an email telling why the day was special. You don’t need to go on and on, but give us enough information so we can share in your joy. Attach a photo if you have one.

We want to publish a few of these stories in the upcoming June issue.

And, we are working on a prize for one outstanding story.

It’ll be local and it’ll be fun. But

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the real prize will be the pleasant feeling that will envelop you as you relive that neat day in your life.

Send your emails to me at editor@ncwgoodlife.com.

We are making a few changes to make The Good Life better.

Local bird watcher and photographer Matt Radford will share a photo each month along with a story on a feathered find.

Matt was born and raised on a southeast Idaho farm, where he loved watching birds along the Snake River. Eventually, he graduated from Idaho State University with a degree in biology, and studied many aspects of bird biology before going to work for the Idaho Department of Fish and Game as a wildlife technician.

More recently he has worked in pharmaceutical sales and in sales and marketing. Currently, he helps local businesses with marketing on Facebook and other social media and is the owner of Mad Rooster Photography and Marketing.

Look for Matt’s column — Tweets from the bush — on page 38 in this issue.

Matt’s column will displace the events highlights listing (“5 reasons to venture out”) we used to print in that spot. Instead, we are packaging our arts and events info into a new section called… what else but Arts & Entertainment. It starts on page 31. Check it out.

Be forward looking, but don’t forget the glories of the past.

Enjoy The Good Life.

— Mike

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OPENING SHOT ®

Year 6, Number 5 May 2012 The Good Life is published by NCW Good Life, LLC, dba The Good Life 10 First Street, Suite 108 Wenatchee, WA 98801 PHONE: (509) 888-6527 EMAIL: editor@ncwgoodlife.com

sales@ncwgoodlife.com ONLINE: www.ncwgoodlife.com FACEBOOK: facebook.com/pages/ The-Good-Life

a flowery spring at the lake Here’s a springtime photo

taken last year from Union Valley, between Chelan and Manson, by Sy Stepanov.

“I started photography, as anyone does, as a hobby at age 12,” said Sy. “I borrowed my brother’s camera on and off for a few years until I could afford one of my own.

“We came to the U.S. as refu-

gees from the former U.S.S.R. in 1988. I make a living as a commercial, advertising and architectural photographer.”

Sy’s work is often featured at the local website, GoLakeChelan.com, where site owner Jerry Isenhart has displayed several of Sy’s photos during the past few years.

Sy also has a website at stepanovphotography.com.

On the cover

Wenatchee in a photo taken on a fresh Saturday morning by editor Mike Cassidy.

You have to be watchful when running trails for bumps and holes said Joel, but the uneven surface is good for the development of calf muscles.

It’s not only the ground that can be a hazard. Joel once took a spill when his dog — a sometime trail companion — darted into the way sending the runner for a painful tumble.

Joel Rhyner poses alongside the Sage Hills Trail above

Editor/Publisher, Mike Cassidy Contributors, Sy Stepanov, Joel Rhyner, Nancy Warner, Kathryn Stevens, Amanda Halle, Rhys Logan, Kelli Dilks, Donna Cassidy, Bonnie Orr, Alex Saliby, Jim Brown, June Darling, Dan McConnell, Susan Lagsdin, Rod Molzahn and Matt Radford Advertising sales, John Hunter, Lianne Taylor and Donna Cassidy Bookkeeping and circulation, Donna Cassidy Proofing, Joyce Pittsinger Ad design, Rick Conant TO SUBSCRIBE: For $25, ($30 out of state address) you can have 12 issues of The Good Life mailed to you or a friend. Send payment to: The Good Life 10 First Street, Suite 108 Wenatchee, WA 98801 Phone 888-6527 Online: www.ncwgoodlife.com To subscribe/renew by email, send credit card info to: donna@ncwgoodlife.com BUY A COPY of The Good Life at Hastings, Caffé Mela (Wenatchee and East Wenatchee), Walgreens (Wenatchee and East Wenatchee), the Wenatchee Food Pavilion, Mike’s Meats, Martin’s Market Place (Cashmere) and A Book for All Seasons (Leavenworth) ADVERTISING: For information about advertising in The Good Life, contact advertising at (509) 8886527, or sales@ncwgoodlife.com WRITE FOR THE GOOD LIFE: We welcome articles about people from Chelan and Douglas counties.

Send your idea to Mike Cassidy at editor@ncwgoodlife.com

The Good Life® is a registered trademark of NCW Good Life, LLC.

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‘If I go for a run, I can come back and function so much better, no matter how the day is going’

running for joy

Joel Rhyner is in a world of his own as he runs along the Sage Hills Trail.

By Joel Rhyner

R

unning on twisting trails deep in the forest miles above Cashmere, I was exploring a possible course for a new offroad event — and wondering just how wise it was to be chugging alone up the mountainside when I didn’t know what would be around the next turn.

But there I was last spring, wearing my RunWenatchee hat, mapping out the route for the new Red Devil Challenge trail run.

A couple weeks later I did it again. I had to.

Put it this way: If you’re a longdistance runner, you carry your body around the course once — on race day. If you’re the race director for a new event, you run the course at least twice to make sure no surprises await.

My group, RunWenatchee, puts on three other races during the year — the Lake Chelan Marathon and Half-Marathon, and River Run and Turkey on

the Run, both in Wenatchee. But the Red Devil Challenge is the only one that is on trails. I’ve always had a love for trails so being able to design the course a year ago was one special and fun chore.

And challenging. I had to determine the course mileage, how safe the trail would be, where we could put aid stations, and how

we would get supplies to those aid stations — all the while running and gaining 4,000 feet in elevation spread out over 15 miles.

And doing it all alone. Was that a branch that I heard just snap back there?

I had to envision all possibilities that could arise — real or otherwise — on the scheduled

June race day. What if it rained hard and torrents of water came rushing down the slopes? What if it was 90 degrees out? It’s not only the terrain you have to think about but what Mother Nature is going to throw at you.

It can change completely the dynamics of a race.

I quickly realized, though, that dedicated trail runners would take a hankering to this new race, just as I had suspected when I scouted a trail map on WenatcheeOutdoors.org beforehand.

Smack between Mission Ridge and Cashmere, the place is stunning in its diversity. You travel through several microclimates that support their own worlds — first deciduous trees, then pines, sandy soil, flowering balsam root, and finally conifers — before you reach the top, where you get all these neat views. On the backside, you look down into Mission Creek and Devil’s Gulch.

From where I live in Wenatchee, it takes just 45 minutes to drive to the trailhead.

But as I ran the area last spring, taking mental notes of everything from trail spurs to rocky vistas, I felt like I was out in nowhere. It was so peaceful.

Yet from a race director’s

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The runners ... found the loop course difficult but rewarding.

They raved about the solemn beauty.

They promised to come back. }}} Continued from previous page standpoint, I also was thinking, “This is going to be one hard run.”

As it turned out, many of my conclusions were accurate. The runners who participated in the inaugural Red Devil Challenge found the loop course difficult but rewarding. They raved about the solemn beauty. They promised to come back.

Which, from a runner’s standpoint, is one good review.

I was elated.

Joel Rhyner maintains a good pace in the Yakima Skyline 25K Run in April 2011. The trail run takes participants from Selah to the Yakima River Recreation Area. Total elevation gain during the event is 4,500 feet. “It’s a brutal race,” Joel says.

Now, we’re getting ready for year 2. This year’s race is set for June 3.

Pulling it all off is no easy task. Months of planning and marketing go into it. There are a gazillion things to get — shirts, awards, food, water, electrolyte drinks, bibs, brochures, posters, course markers, banners. You have to take out insurance, ar-

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range for transportation, keep a website updated, answer questions. And that’s just for starters.

Of course, here in Chelan County with all our natural beauty, it makes it all so worthwhile.

Much of what I have learned on how to put on a good event comes from my own athletic career, including more than 100 races post-college.

I first picked up the sport of running when I was a kid in Mount Horeb, Wisc., a small town outside Madison. I then ran in high school and at the University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse, where I did the 400 and 800 in track for four years. Our team was super strong. We won four indoor and outdoor national championships.

It wasn’t until I was in graduate school, however, that I discovered the joys of long-distance running and triathlons. My first big event was Grandma’s Marathon in Duluth in 1991. I completed the 26.2 miles in two hours, 48 minutes. Before then, when I was younger, I never really did anything longer than a 5K. After moving to Seattle for a job with Boeing as an exercise physiologist, I signed up for the 1993 Ironman Canada triathlon.

Not only did I finish but I qualified for Hawaii and the world championships.

Hawaii ended up being the

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hardest thing I’ve ever done. I’ve done six Ironmen since, but Hawaii was less than eight weeks after Ironman Canada and it was hot. Swimming in the ocean was really surreal.

Salt water is buoyant, you’re swimming with 1,800 people, there were sharks and turtles, and you can see 60 feet down.

The bike portion is much hillier than you would think, and the winds are brutal. I was really dehydrated. I just ate and drank.

I ate and drank everything in sight. After the bike leg, I ran the marathon in three hours, 38 minutes.

It was probably the highlight of my athletic life. It was the world championships. Not that I’m a world champion. But you’re there, you’re around those people. I felt strong on the run and had a solid bike. And the experience of running down Alii Drive — the finish area with throngs of people — is amazing.

In 1998, I married Michele at Mountain Springs Lodge near Leavenworth. We used to hang out a lot in Leavenworth and Wenatchee when we lived on the other side of the mountains.

We’d camp, hike, bring our bikes out and get out of the rain.

We have two kids now. We met in 1995. I was working at Stevens Hospital in Edmonds in cardiac rehab. Michele was working at Stevens doing vascular ultrasound.

After moving to Wenatchee in 2005 with my family, I became involved with the triathlon club initially and met people like Jason Jablonski, Jennifer Korfiatis, Stephanie and Alex Cosina, Cora Sturzl and Sarah Barkley. I started helping Sarah and Martha Amrine with the Thanksgiving Day run and then when Sarah moved to the Tri-Cities, I partnered with Martha and that’s how RunWenatchee was kind of born.

We started saying we can do more with this. We can do a website. At the same time, Ted and Lynda Finegold and Ian and Wendy Crossland were build-

ing the Wenatchee and Leavenworth marathons, and we saw that growth and thought there was an opportunity there.

So we started River Run in Wenatchee and the Red Devil Challenge trail run near Cashmere. Last year, we also took over the Lake Chelan Shore to Shore Marathon and Half-Marathon.

When Martha moved to Missoula last fall, Steve Maher stepped in to help me. Steve was an editor at The Wenatchee World and comes from a running family — his brother, nephew and niece operate the Eugene Marathon — so it’s been a good fit.

With RunWenatchee, a big part of what we do is encourage people to get out and run and help coach them if they ask for assistance. It doesn’t matter what their goal is — it could be a 5K or it could be a marathon.

At our Tuesday track workouts, I get a big kick out of a newbie runner showing up and saying, “I don’t know what to do, can you help me?” Introducing someone to running is huge. I gain so much from taking my love of running and passing it on to others so they can enjoy it.

The potential in Chelan County is huge. Between all our trails, including the Apple Capital Recreation Loop Trail, and the events that are already established, we have a big opportunity to grow and provide high quality, learner-friendly races that draw people from all over the Northwest.

People sometimes ask what attracts me to running. I tell them it’s the simplicity, the place it puts you, and the scenery.

For example, when I was in Seattle this past spring break, I ran for an hour. It wasn’t a super long time. I didn’t run it fast.

It was just this mental state of, “I’m at peace. I’m on the BurkeGilman Trail. It’s spring. It’s this perfect place.” If I go for a run, I can come back and function so much better, no matter how the day is going.

Race along with runwenatchee RunWenatchee’s website can be found at www.runwenatchee. com. It includes an event calendar, training tips, youth activities, blogs, photos and videos, and recommended road and trail runs in Chelan County.

RunWenatchee also puts on four races each year. All the races help raise money for local charities and community groups. They are: June 3 — Red Devil Challenge, a 25-kilometer trail run in the Wenatchee National Forest south of Cashmere, runwenatchee.com Sept. 8 — Lake Chelan Shore to Shore Marathon, Half-Marathon and 10K, lakechelanmarathon. com Running is the kind of sport where you grab your shoes and you’re gone.

I refuse to run with music but I know a lot of people do, and that’s fine. If I’m running out-

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Sept. 15 — River Run at the Taste of the Harvest Festival, half-marathon, 10K and 5K starting and ending in downtown Wenatchee, runwenatchee.com Nov. 22 — Turkey on the Run, 12K, 5K and kids run starting and ending at Rotary Park in Wenatchee, runwenatchee.com Also, RunWenatchee holds free weekly workouts at the Wenatchee High School track during the warm weather months and social “pub runs” in Wenatchee all year-long. For more on those activities, “LIKE” RunWenatchee on Facebook: www.facebook.com/RunWenatchee side, on the loop trail or Sage Hills, it’s therapy. It’s simple.

And nothing else can get in the way.

All one has to do is take a little jaunt in our foothills to get

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a sense of how blessed we are here. I went for a run recently from my house up to the top of Sage Hills where the pine trees begin.

The beauty along the trails and the challenge of going uphill — both physically and mentally — is uplifting. The sights from the vistas blow you away.

So there I was that day looking down on Wenatchee — just a few miles away in the distance — all by myself.

And that’s one of the amazing things about this place. Two people can go for a run in the same trail system — in this case, Sage Hills — and never run into each other. You can totally get lost.

Joel Rhyner is a partner in RunWenatchee, which operates a website (www.runwenatchee.com), puts on four races each year, and sponsors track workouts, clinics and social runs. His day job is with the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center as a cardiology physician’s assistant.

A feel for the

music Whether it’s holding a free-flowing jazz ‘conversation’ or seeking perfection with old time songs, success in music is measured by how many others join in

By Nancy Warner

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huck Egner quietly moves across the room and begins plucking notes from the taut strings of his standup bass.

Lured by the call, Dan Jackson and other musicians leave the dinner table to join the conversation. The strum of one guitar is answered by another. One voice leads and another picks up the harmony. Soon music fills the air in this studio high above Icicle Creek. It is the sound of a good idea in action.

Bringing people together to make music is a passion for Chuck Egner and Dan Jackson, and one they indulged while developing the music for the Gathering Our Voice project, Foodways & Byways —The Story of Food in North Central Washington.

The goal of the Gathering Our Voice program is to shine a light on diverse success stories that inspire and can help us grow as a region.

Over the past four years, nearly 200 residents of North Central Washington have shared their success stories about this place through this program of the non-profit Initiative for Rural Innovation & Stewardship (IRIS).

Chuck Egner had a choice to make in high school: music or football. He chose football then, but it’s been music since.

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Most of the voices gathered have been through recording spoken interviews.

But last year, Dan Jackson, longtime music teacher at Wenatchee High School, Chuck Egner, owner of Hi Strung Recording Studio in Leavenworth, and 14 other talented local musicians expanded this regional voice to include music.

Inspired by the musicians and the way they created music for the Foodways & Byways DVD, I was eager to learn more about the musicians’ backgrounds and motivation for sharing their talents.

I started this exploration with Dan and Chuck, who together directed and produced the accompanying music CD, by talking with them about their respective musical paths and the success their journey has brought to their own lives and to that of the community.

Even though Dan and Chuck have come at music from remarkably different angles, their experiences reflect a number of similarities including early exposure to music through their families.

Dan’s family attended a church in Wenatchee where the only instrument allowed was the human voice. So by the time he was 12 years old “I would lead the singing,” he remembered, adding, “the nice thing about that was with no instruments you’d have to produce your own harmony.”

While Dan was developing his ear and his rich singing voice in church, he was frustrated when a test paired him with the violin, an instrument that he said he “just does not have the hands to play.”

By the time he was in high school, he had met Earl Norwood, who helped him move from the violin into choral music. “Earl Norwood is the reason I’m in music today,” he said. “He became my mentor and still is.”

Dan leans forward when he remembers what it was like when he first began to sing in

A luncheon to celebrate the release of the DVD for the Foodways & Byways —The Story of Food in North Central Washington brings together musicians Sherry Krebs, All Strings Considered in Wenatchee, Michael Carlos from Wenatchee, Chuck Egner and Julie Ashmore, Oroville. Photos by Kathryn Stevens

the school choir and in musicals.

“It was like a new world for me that just opened up,” he said, and one that put his own voice in perspective.

“It was an awesome powerful choir. And here’s little ole’ me sitting in the middle of this choir hearing these chords.”

It was a transforming experience which grew richer as he got into musicals, he recalled. “The magic of a musical — the makeup, the backstage — the whole scene totally hooked me. It gets in your blood really fast.”

Both of Chuck’s parents were

May 2012 | The Good Life

music teachers when he was growing up in North Carolina, “so music was always part of the scene,” he remembers.

He played clarinet and alto saxophone in the school band and excelled in football. So when “the band director said you have to either be in band or football,” he opted for football with support from his parents.

But the influence of music was strong and by the time he graduated from high school he had bought his first Martin guitar.

Along with the guitar, Chuck bought a collection of Woody

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Guthrie songs that he listened to again and again, getting the music he would someday play into his head.

Dan followed his interest in music through college and graduate school returning to Wenatchee in the 1970s to take a job as the choral director at Wenatchee High School, a position he held for 30 years.

Whereas Dan’s life was filled with the pursuit of music and helping students find their voice, Chuck said he merely “noodled” with his guitar until a

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}}} Continued from previous page job brought him to Seattle in the 1990s.

This “bluegrass wasteland,” as he described it, provided little opportunity to get into actually playing the music he loved. That all changed when he and his wife Candace bought a vacation cabin in Plain in 2000.

“I heard about this bluegrass program on KOHO that Rob Newsome hosted.” Chuck remembers telling his wife: “He’s from the south — we’ve got to go meet this guy.”

Rob quickly invited Chuck to join a local group of musicians in a jam session. “I realized right away I couldn’t play with those guys,” he remembered. “They were upper intermediate to lower experts and I was beginner plus.

“But it motivated me. So I spent two or three years for the first time in my life really practicing.”

Chuck’s method involved listening repeatedly to the songs

Dan Jackson enjoys a glass of 37 Cellars wine at the DVD release party.

he wanted to play while driving over to the cabin from Seattle.

“I would listen to a song such as Goldrush over and over and over,” he said. “Then I would get into that cabin and I had it so

nailed down in my head when I sat down all I had to do was get it into my fingers.”

Although retired now from teaching at Wenatchee High School, Dan still practices choral music, currently directing three different choirs as well as the Icicle Creek Youth Symphony.

His approach is to get the music into the heads of his choir members as soon as possible.

“When I start a choir on a new piece of music, I make sure within the first two pages they’re connected with the music,” he said. “Get them through the piece of music. Then you can go back and find all those notes they missed.”

For Chuck, playing music with others is the same as having a really interesting conversation.

“In jam sessions you pass the solos around the room, you never know what the next guy is going to play or who is going to show up and play harmonies.

It’s not assigned. It’s a really free flowing thing. It can sound like garbage sometimes but those

times when it doesn’t, whoa — you’re just looking for that next time.”

It’s a different process, Dan said, with church choirs where “you’ve got a lot of people trying to do the same thing — make the music as good as it can be.”

However, in musicals you do have to create what’s going on onstage, he added. “You don’t change the music necessarily, but you can influence the way the audience hears it based on how you stage it and cast the actors. That’s where I relate to the magic that Chuck’s talking about.”

Dan and Chuck both volunteer to help bring more music to the community. It’s something they both find personally gratifying.

“Its part of everybody’s need to feel like their life is useful and significant,” Dan said. “I don’t want to do it just to put in the time but I’d like to be involved if it’s actually helping people and making a difference and even better if it’s producing some music, like Foodways & Byways, that wasn’t there before.”

For Chuck much of his interest in contributing his music and recording studio time to a project such as Foodways & Byways, the annual Bluegrass Festival and other community projects he’s involved in comes down to fellowship.

“That’s why I’m in it — it’s a communal thing,” he said, that, unlike his previous hobbies of baseball and racing cars, “will last until the end — until I go off to the happy hunting ground.”

Nancy Warner, coordinator for the Initiative for Rural Innovation & Stewardship, lives in Wenatchee with her husband and two golden retrievers. She is also a beginning mandolin player working to get the music from her head to her fingers.

To learn more about the Foodways & Byways Music CD and the musicians, view the video, download companion materials, and learn more about Gathering Our Voice visit: www. gatheringourvoice.org. For more information contact the IRIS office at irisncw@gmail.com or 888-7374.

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Making a connection in

Tanzania Herding the family cattle and goats is the most common role of young Maasai boys.

Writer was Hot and dirty amid a nomadic tribe in Africa — and exactly where she needed to be story by Amanda Halle photos by rhys logan

It was nearly pitch black in-

side the small, mud hut.

The sweltering African sun shone only through a small hole in the wall, casting just enough light to make out the welcoming face of the home’s owner.

Swarms of flies clutched the areas of my skin that weren’t covered by my long skirt and loose t-shirt. Smoke from the fire at our feet burned my lungs.

My surroundings were completely unparalleled to any world I had ever experienced, but even as foreign language danced around me, I couldn’t deny the feeling I was exactly where I needed to be.

For three months I lived with a camera hanging from my neck, a note pad in my hand, and a constant layer of dirt on my skin.

As a volunteer journalist I was assisting Jack and Holly Stagge with Faces 4 Hope, a nonprofit organization they founded in 2009 in Northern Tanzania.

All of my previous knowledge about Africa was based on television ads and newspaper articles I’d read about extreme poverty, disease, genocide and lack of clean water.

For years I had desired to experience the reality of suffering and truly understand the needs by going there myself. So together with my college friend, Rhys Logan, from Waterville, we packed our bags full of camera May 2012 | The Good Life

Amanda shares smiles and porridge with the children at the preschool in Engikaret, Tanzania.

equipment and set off with the Stagges to Tanzania for three months.

Focusing on tribal Maasai communities, Faces 4 Hope works to educate, enable and empower tribal people by not only meeting needs but also www.ncwgoodlife.com

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providing opportunity.

The vision began in 2007 when Jack Stagge, a physical therapist in Wenatchee, and his wife Holly traveled to Tanzania for a short-term mission trip and felt a connection that was

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Amanda shows Ruth, a Maasai woman, how she looks in her celebratory ornaments.

Tanzania }}} Continued from previous page anything but temporary.

After experiencing the desperate needs for basic survival, the Stagges felt a divine calling to dedicate their lives to helping the Maasai. Faces 4 Hope now operates year-round with programs in school sponsorship, famine relief, medical care, micro-loan and job training, clean water and community fellowship.

In January Rhys and I accompanied the Stagges on their ninth trip to Tanzania.

Aiming to spend about six months of the year in Tanzania, the Stagges desire to continue building relationships with the people and learn more about the unique culture they serve.

As a semi-nomadic tribe that stretches through Northern Tanzania and Kenya, the Maasai are best known for their distinctive traditional customs and dress. Living mostly in rural areas, Maasai make their homes, called bomas, out of stick, mud,

Holly Stagge embraces a young Maasai girl on a walk through the bush.

and cow dung and make their living by herding cattle and goats or by selling beadwork in the markets.

The Maasai have largely avoided invasion of modernization and have preserved their traditional culture for hundreds of years. Like many areas in Africa, tribes in Northern Tanzania are constantly threatened by drought, famine and disease.

But being Maasai poses a whole other fight for survival.

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Recognizing it’s impact in ending the cycle of poverty, Faces 4 Hope has made education a primary focus in the communities it serves. Because of their nomadic ways and residence in rural areas, schools are rarely in a close enough proximity for Maasai children to attend.

Since school is a relatively new establishment in Maasai culture, the value and desire for an education is still very low. In an area known as Engikaret, Faces

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4 Hope has helped construct a pre-school and primary school, which now serves over 75 Maasai children.

One of my favorite things to do was to watch each morning as their little shapes would emerge from the savanna surrounding the school. Coming from their mud homes, dressed in their one pair of clothes, still covered in dirt.

Anytime I sat down with a group of them during a recess break I was instantly covered by a million little fingers. They were fascinated with my long hair, my white skin and my shiny jewelry.

It warmed my heart to know these children were receiving an education, something every child should have the right to, but so many children were still being deprived of it.

Instead, many Maasai children are taught to herd goats as early as age three. They can’t go to school because they have duties to cook and care for babies in the home.

I never valued my own education so much as when I looked into the eyes of a young child who would never have the chance to go to school.

Many young Maasai girls are given as wives in exchange for cattle before they even reach puberty. If children are given the initial opportunity to go to school, many are stopped short once they reach secondary school, about high school age.

Secondary school fees are very expensive and are impossible to be paid by families that are nearly starving.

I had the honor of meeting the 30 young students who Faces 4 Hope currently sends to secondary school through their sponsorship program.

Through interviews and video shoots with Rhys, we were able to hear personal stories and desires to continue their education. One after another expressed the wish to change their way of life. They not only wanted to lift themselves out

“Retirement just doesn’t have the element that feels like you are making a difference...” of poverty but also wanted to better their families’ lives and villages.

Some students desired to become doctors, teachers, or even lawyers, but even as they dreamed of their future, their focus wasn’t on personal gain; it was about helping others. Helping those they love and those they don’t even know.

This was the Africa Rhys and I were able to discover and the Africa that brought a new purpose to the lives of the Stagges.

When thinking about where their lives would be if they hadn’t started Faces 4 Hope, Jack said, “Retirement just doesn’t have the element that feels like you are making a difference in the world.”

Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath the way she would during the many emotional moments we had Tanzania, Holly admits that “making a difference” is not an easy road to take.

It is one thing to hear about the young girls being forced into marriage, but holding their sobbing bodies in your arms as Holly has can be very tolling on a heart’s persistence.

“There are so many days that I just cry because there is so

Jack Stagge and translator Bariki encourage Maasai women to be strong female role models for their children and community.

dusty terrain may lack the luxuries that other retirees enjoy in Palm Springs, the Stagges say the feel confident in pushing forward with their mission with no regrets.

“Hanging everything on worldly life is foolish,” Jack said.

“Nothing rewards you better than being were you were meant to be.”

Young Maasai children run out from their homes to greet visitors.

much need and I feel helpless,” she said. “But seeing even just one girl go to school or one face

May 2012 | The Good Life

change with the offering of hope makes it all worth it.”

So while Tanzania’s dry and

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Amanda Halle is a non-profit entrepreneur and writer from East Wenatchee, with a website at RelativeRealities.wordpress.com.

Rhys Logan is a professional photographer and freelance journalist from Waterville. See more of his photos at Rhystomahawk.com.

To learn more about Faces 4 Hope visit Faces4Hope.org.

Unexpected Patagonia ABOVE: The Cuernos (the Horns) — a section of the Massif, a mass of granite peaks and spires — loom over Lago Pehoe and Hostel Pehoe.

meandering through the SPECTACULAR scenery AT THE BOTTOM OF south America

By Kelli Dilks

I

n Patagonia, it is said, “The wind is King.”

The temperature was balmy, but the clouds were frowning.

My daughter and I were hopeful though, that today, the King would be kind.

We joined seven other travelers from around the world who also lodged at Patagonia Camp just outside the Chilean Parque Nacional Torres del Paine.

We planned to trek to the Base of the Towers in the center of the Massif, a huge mass of granite peaks and spires that rises from the Patagonian steppes.

LEFT: Perito Moreno Glacier rises almost 200 feet above the frigid, fresh water of Lago Argentino.

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A nandu and her chicks wander across the Chilean pampas.

Ninety minutes into the eight-hour hike, however, balmy transitioned to nippy, then to downright freezing. Four members of our trekking group holed up in a refugio filled with cold, sodden fellow hikers, muddy boots and wet, wool socks. They had decided to wait in relative comfort for the more stubborn of us as we continued up to the Towers.

Eventually though, the Towers were obscured by clouds, the wind’s force increased, the rain drenched our water resistant gear and the temperature plunged further. With conditions predicted to deteriorate, two hours remaining to climb up to the Base, four hours of descent, and ominous warnings from seasoned Tower trekkers, we turned back.

Thoughts of returning the following day were dashed as the weather forecast was predicted to be even more wet, cold and windy. The King had won.

My daughter, Cori Tift of New York City, joined me in Patagonia, South America, this past January. Having hiked the Peruvian Inca Trail to Machu Picchu three years ago, we were both drawn to return to remote villages, mountains and footpaths of South America.

Our itinerary of Chile focused on the Torres del Paine (Towers of Blue), but we found the pampas, steppes, lakes and glaciers of the Parque to be equally spectacular.

We meandered through an area known as “Puma’s Kitchen.”

Beech trees, calafate bushes and native grasses add to the visual, gustatory and tactile experience of Patagonia.

The calafate bush produces dark purple berries that are used to color woven wool textiles, flavor jams and syrups and provide a splash of magenta to the local beverage, the pisco sour.

The wildlife was abundant and clearly unimpressed by the presence of humans as well as pumas. Guanacos (forbearers of the llama), nandus (the South American version of the ostrich), pumas, Chilean flamingos and Andean condors populate the steppes.

Our next destination was El Calafate, Argentina.

We travelled by bus and crossed into Argentina at a desolate outpost. This border crossing is lonely, well in the middle of absolutely nothing.

The station sits on a graveled road that joins this remote area of Chile and Argentina, protected by swinging metal barricades and six armed guards, who must experience long periods of boredom. Behind one of the facility’s service counters lurks a lopsided ping-pong table and two paddles. The ball was nowhere to be seen.

El Calafate is strikingly similar to Central Washington — basalt cliffs, sagebrush-littered high desert and Lago Argentino, which resembles a larger version May 2012 | The Good Life

Kelli Dilks and daughter Cori Tift try out some Chilean wine.

of the Columbia River.

It embraces tourists who visit Argentina’s Los Glacieras National Park, wanting to experience the spectacular glacier Perito Moreno and granite spire, Mount Fitz Roy. Cori and I had hoped that being farther north, the King would concede, but Patagonia is Patagonia, no matter the latitude or country. The buffeting and drenching continued and the King continued to win.

The road from El Calafate to the Perito Moreno Glacier meanders through a huge, dry valley carved by glacial ice that hugs Lago Argentino. Huge erratic boulders are strewn haphazardly on the valley floor, midway to the skyline and even placed on the tops of the hills, testament to the strength and depth of the www.ncwgoodlife.com

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rivers of ice that once covered Patagonia.

Picturing the magnitude of these prehistoric glaciers is difficult.

The surviving remnant, Perito Moreno Glacier, is still impressive, rising almost 200 feet above the frigid, fresh water of Lago Argentino. Its midsection merges in the distance with mountains and clouds; its origin can only be imagined.

The ice groans, snaps and booms thunderously every few minutes as it creeps forward.

Huge slabs of ice slide off the vertical leading edge of the glacier, slamming into the lake.

Icebergs calve after every break in the cloud cover, which allows the sun to disrupt icy bonds that have held for centuries.

This is the most phenomenal, mesmerizing and unexpectedly moving experience of our entire Patagonia trip. It also heralded the end of our travels together.

Once again, Cori and I succumbed to the magnetism and raw beauty of South America; we have listed the places we want to experience on our next trip to the continent. We were told that eating the berry of the el calafate bush would ensure a return visit to Patagonia ….. I ate seven.

Kelli Dilks is a nurse practitioner who has lived most of her life in the Wenatchee area. She is a managing partner of AnovaWorks, an occupational medicine company. Cori Tift grew up in the Wenatchee Valley and is currently working in Manhattan in digital media and advertising.

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column moving up to the good life

june darling

Want to age well?

Pay attention to the wisdom your elders have learned through the years

We can live with gusto into

our 80s and beyond if we heed the wisdom of our elders.

Researchers have amassed a

great deal of data and suggestions for successful aging from studying those who are living well in their 80s, 90s, and even 100s.

The first suggestion for a good, long life will be no surprise.

Every study out there says the same thing — don’t smoke.

Other findings may be more unexpected.

Dr. George Vaillant of Harvard Medical School gives a rather extraordinary conclusion.

After studying the findings of 824 participants who were followed for over 60 years, Vaillant says that lifestyle choices are more important than anything else including genetics. Here are the lifestyle suggestions for aging well. n Develop a “make lemonade out of lemons” approach to life. n Keep a healthy weight. n Exercise regularly. n Maintain strong social relationships (including a stable marriage). n Keep learning.

A massive longitudinal study was begun in 1921 by Dr. Lewis Terman. He and his successors tracked 1,500 bright children for more than 80 years.

The findings were compiled into The Longevity Project by professors Friedman and Martin.

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n Be conscientious (plan, organize). n Have a fairly high level of physical activity. n Make it a habit to give back to the community. n Have a good, long-running career. n Have a healthy marriage and family life. n Summon your resilience against reversals of fortune and challenges (divorce, loss of spouse, war, career upsets, health issues). n Don’t view every calamity as a catastrophe.

Gerontologist Dr. Karl Pillemer decided to survey and interview over 1,200 older people. His work continues as The Legacy Project. A summary of the elders’ advice includes the following. n Choose a career for the intrinsic rewards, not the financial ones. n Act now like you will need your body for 100 years: Stop using “I don’t care how long I live” as an excuse for bad health habits.

Behaviors like smoking, poor eating habits and inactivity are

Cut down on your worrying.

It’s a colossal waste of your precious lifetime. less likely to kill you than to sentence you to years or decades of chronic disease.

The elders have seen the devastation that a bad lifestyle causes in the last decades of life — act now to prevent it they say. n Say “Yes” to opportunities: When offered a new opportunity or challenge, you are much less likely to regret saying “yes” and more likely to regret turning it down. They suggest you take a risk and a leap of faith when opportunity knocks. n Cut down on your worrying. It’s a colossal waste of your precious lifetime. Indeed, one of the major regrets expressed by the elders was time wasted worrying about things that never happened. n Think small. When it comes to making the most of your life, attune yourself to simple daily pleasures and learn to savor them now. n Travel, make memories.

in every fuss. Pray. Enjoy touching, sex and sensuality. Compliment each other, keep up with what’s going on in each other’s lives. n Don’t waste your sorrow, do something useful with it. n Walk 30 minutes five days a week. n Drink a little glass of wine every day. n Be authentic, don’t hide from your values. n Don’t compare your life (your spouse’s or your kids’) to anyone else’s. n Stay involved. Maintain a certain amount of routine, but keep learning and contributing through every loss and every season of your life. n Have a very small wardrobe of good quality clothes. Get rid of old clothes, keep buying a few new things, but always take something out when you bring home something new.

Keep your hair looking nice — dyeing it or wearing a wig or hat may make you feel younger

(Never go around with a “bed head.”) n Don’t ignore the tough stuff in life, but focus on finding the good. Walk beside people in pain. Appreciate all the working people who are contributing to your welfare like the police, farmers, garbage collectors, teachers, doctors and nurses.

“To know how to grow old is the masterwork of wisdom and one of the most difficult chapters in the great art of living well,” said Swiss poet and moral

philosopher Henri Amiel in 1874.

If we want to grow old well, we’d better pay attention to our elders.

How might you age well by paying attention to your elders and move up to The Good Life?

June Darling, Ph.D., is an executive coach who consults with businesses and individuals to achieve goals and increase happiness. She can be reached at drjunedarling@aol.com, or drjunedarling.blogspot.com or at her twitter address: twitter.com/ drjunedarling. Her website is www. summitgroupresources.com.

Join us for the Grand Opening Saturday 6-2-2012

12:00 - 4:00 • Tour Model Homes

• Interior Designer On-site • Live Radio Remote

When it comes to aging well advice, the person I really pay attention to is the youngest, brightest, feistiest 81 year old I know… my mother. (Happy Mother’s Day, mom!)

Mom loves working four days a week as a therapist. Here’s what I’ve learned from her. n The big elements for the good life are strong relationships, humor and spirituality (purpose and meaning in life). n Read to your children.

You will most regret not having spent more time with your children. n Marriage is more than 5050. Always do more than your part. Learn from each other, take responsibility for your part

• Eastmont High School’s Talented Jazz Band Choralier, Chamber & Eclipse Vocal Jazz Choirs

S. Lyle & 8th St. East Wenatchee

Complimentary Country Boys BBQ Lunch $1,500+ of Exceptional Drawings & Giveaways

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Happy

between a

rock and a river Story by Susan Lagsdin Photos by Donna Cassidy

Jan and Tom Short get a kick

TOP: Jan and Tom Short built their home overlooking the Wenatchee River in an area of fruit orchards.

ABOVE: Outside becomes inside, and even the patio roof (see left) was designed to let maximum light into transoms on the main floor living area.

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out of hosting a tour of their Cashmere home.

They built it high above the Wenatchee River close to Pinnacles State Park, and it shares some of that landmark’s distinctive geology.

Their lot is 1.42 steep acres.

“We decided from the very beginning not to visually compete with nature — we knew nature would win out,” said Tom. They didn’t want to be exposed, high and lonesome, with the house as the star of the show, so they situated it to be as visually unobtrusive as possible behind a cliff and between two high bookend pinnacles.

Tom said, “It took two weeks of heavy equipment chipping away at this rock before we could put slab on grade.” The base is half dirt, half rock; a 14-foot engineered wall bolsters

the foundation. The house is nestled into and around massive rocks, with just a glimpse of roofline and walls visible from the highway.

Approaching the age of settling in, Tom wanted what he calls a “bulletproof ” exterior.

Stucco walls, even stucco eaves, synthetic decking, powder-coated railings, and a no-care yard.

“I don’t own a lawn mower,” he said, “I wanted this whole place made so I’d never have to fiddle with it.”

Sturdy and unpretentious on the outside, soaring and artful on the inside, the home features enough personal, quirky must-haves that touring it is like unwrapping a present.

“We love it when people come in and are surprised — it’s really fun to see their reactions when things aren’t always where they expect them to be,” said Jan. The interior also demonstrates the couple’s personal perspective, which trumped easier convention throughout the design/ building process, but eventually brought the builders’ admiration.

Seven wall angles and a cantilevered ceiling complicated the wedge shaped family room, but created a roundness that promotes socializing.

There are no doors on the three showers in the house — and pocket doors in short hallways and wherever else they made sense for convenience.

An elevator can be installed at any time to zip from garage

Guests enjoy two layers of hospitality: the efficient and compact food prep area, and the 24-foot bar fronted with granite and leather panels.

and two-bedroom guest level up to the main floor. The shaft and mechanism already exist, masked now by usable hall closets.

Furnishings, too, distinguish themselves. A big walnut bed defies most boudoir designs: it floats in the center of the master suite, with all-around access, facing a full size window.

Jan deliberately placed only a few pieces of comfortable corner

}}} Continued on next page

This sleek fireplace was positioned chest high to afford more comfortable seating space, and the green shag is one of very few carpets in the house.

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“You can imagine, there have been a lot of s’mores cooked right there by our grandkids.”

Deep, still water at the beach means good swimming, so the long walk down stone steps on a summer’s day is worth it, especially for a picnic.

}}} Continued from previous page seating near the fireplace wall.

“Nobody ever stays seated in a living room for very long,” she said. “Eventually they all wander into the kitchen to see what’s going on.”

The couple loves to entertain, so at the heart of the house is a dark one-piece 24-foot Oregon Claro walnut bar that fronts the kitchen and anchors two small sitting spaces on either side. Jan laughed, “Tom actually had that bar all ready to go before we put in the foundation.”

Outside the kitchen, like a cave dweller’s cook pit, a rounded earthen fireplace is carved deep into the wall of rock abutting the patio. “You can imagine, there have been a lot of s’mores

Jan and Tom use their protected patio often, relaxing together at the end of the day or catching the first morning sun with a cup of coffee.

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cooked right there by our grandkids,” Jan noted.

Eighty-four flat rock steps angle, steep but safe, far down to their beach with its still water swimming hole (a personal engineering chore Tom eschewed after some deliberation).

A main goal was to bathe the house in natural light. The roofline’s extended eaves allow south sun in winter, glass walls open up the 13-foot high main rooms to the outdoors. Tall skylight bays above the kitchen hold clerestory windows. And solar tubes pipe in more sun, meaning the Shorts rarely use a light switch in daytime.

Every window in the Short’s 4,238-square-foot house also has a singular view: winding river, pear orchard, timbered cliff, distant grassy hillsides, one Zen tree on a window-filling rock face.

“Even though it’s large, we didn’t want to squander space,” Tom said. They’re proud that every room on the top, main floor gets used every day. Each space is designed to suit the purpose.

Jan does “just a little bit of office work, so I wanted just this tiny office space.”

Simplicity meets luxury — Tom finally designed their bed of Oregon Claro walnut after a futile hunt for the perfect expose-able headboard.

The media room is a social place, not a cellar hideaway — soft chairs swivel for conversation, and blackout shades are on default up, not down.

A vertical Japanese soaking tub (“They said we’d never use it… not true!” they both agreed.) lends space to the master bath shower.

Returnees to the region, they knew a pre-owned home might not suit them. The Shorts raised their family in East Wenatchee, and later moved full time to Hawaii while Tom flew internationally for Northwest Airlines. Jan had seen plenty of fine homes working as a real estate agent, and they’d lived for years in a dramatic custom-redesigned home in Kona.

On retirement and after choosing this exceptional lot, they were full of design ideas, ready to create a luxurious, longterm shelter.

Jan’s preference was for “contemporary modern,” but she’s glad they didn’t go all the way with its sometimes chilly geometrics. “I admit, I like black and white,” she said. “People were saying all this gray on the walls would be cold, but it’s not, is it?”

No, decidedly not.

“All this gray, “ untextured and unabashedly monotone, is actually carefully mixed shades of pewter and pale sand, a silvery mink color, slightly browned steel. With the prevalence of burnished walnut throughout, large-scale color photographs and bright accents and the daylong shots of pure light, the house is anything but cold.

“I guess you could call it ‘minimalist’ said Tom. “Minimal impact, minimal work and minimal (he gestured to straight lined spaces and spare décor, Jan’s vision.) … design.” Nothing fancy, really. Big enough, sophisticated enough, and, from the first sketches three years ago, just what they had in mind.

Jan and Tom delight in showing the myriad smaller choices

they made together — from heated tile floors to super sound insulated walls, the above-thefridge 42-inch TV that’s almost invisible, slim gas torchéres on a wall that serve as heating elements, and their favorite longtime art pieces.

One “art piece” that lives outside just waiting for summer is a five-foot carved wooden replica of a big-headed alien with magic finger upheld, just like the pesky extra-terrestial of movie fame.

His base is wheeled, so in summer, when rafting trips come bouncing down river past the property, he’s waiting at the patio railing. Frequent riverrunners have learned to seek him out — waving and shouting, “Hello ET!!” in unison as they round the bend.

NCW Home Professionals

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column ALEX ON WINE

ALEX SALIBY

Temperature counts when it comes to wine A little colder here, a little warmer there... and consider an ice cube now and then

L

et’s get right to the point, Americans drink their red wines too warm and their white wines too cold.

This is not a topic open for debate. It is a truth I have come to know and willingly share with you.

I’ll start with the white wines.

If you are about to serve a: n Non vintage Champagne/ sparkling wine, serve it at 45 degrees F. n Vintage Champagne/sparkling wine, serve it at 48 degrees F. “Is that 3 degrees difference really important?” you ask. To palates such as mine that dislike the bubbles anyway, the answer is easy, “No.” However, if you’re an avid and discerning drinker of the bubbly stuff, the answer is a loud and important “Yes.” The temperature affects the bubbles. Too cold and the bubbles of the wine don’t rise as they should; too warm and the bubbles disappear too quickly, the wine becomes flabby.

If you are about to serve: n Light bodied wines such as Albarino, Aligoté, Pinot Grigio, un-oaked Chardonnay, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc or light bodied Rosé, serve them at 50 degrees F. n Full bodied white such as Chardonnay, Roussanne or Viognier, serve at 54 to 56 degrees F. The lighter bodied whites and those Rosé wines are usually bright and acidic; serving them

grapefruit characteristic.

But, remember, that’s me personally. The good book says that’s too cold and will not allow the wine to show you the qualities of its citrus aromas.

Those full bodied whites, particularly a well-made Viognier are all about aromas and texture or mouth-feel, and those characteristics really rise to the surface if the wine is taken out of the refrigerator a good half hour before you open and serve it.

On to the reds; if you are about to serve: n Light-bodied red wines such as Gamay, Beaujolais, Dolceto and more extracted Rosé wines, serve them at 57 degrees F. n Medium-bodied red wines such as Barbera, lighter Chianti, Valpolicella, many Burgundy Pinot Noirs and a great many Bordeaux styled wines, serve them at 61 degrees F. n Full-bodied red wines that have been Wine sleeves cool red wines quickly and keep well extracted, Barolo, white wines cool throughout the meal. They cost about $10. The thermometer is a perfect the reds of the PortuMother’s Day or Father’s Day gift, starting guese Bairida region, around $12.

Grenache, Mourvedre, Syrah and Petit Sirah, Tannat, serve them at between too cold dulls the acidic fresh62 and 64 degrees F. ness.

The reds are a complex array However, I opt to disagree of aromas, textures and flavors, with the standard if I am going and for me, they’re a lot more to serve an overly grape-fruity difficult to pinpoint the reason’s New Zealand styled Sauvignon why temperature is so important Blanc. I want that wine chilled to releasing their real charm. down to refrigerator temperaI can, however, give you one ture to help tone down that

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piece of personal information.

Red wines off the shelf at the local liquor store or at Safeway or Albertson’s, even the top quality premium bottles are sitting there way too hot to show you what they possess as premium wines.

Do yourself a favor, and next time you open a red wine, even a Columbia Crest Two Vines, drop the temperature to a near proximity to that I’ve suggested.

You may be surprised at the difference a few degrees of temperature makes in both the aromas and the flavors.

For all the wines though, whites and reds, remember too that the glass into which you are about to pour them is much warmer than that wine, if you’ve been properly storing the bottles.

When you pour a 50-degree wine into a glass that has sat in the china cabinet in a room where the average temperature has been a consistent 72 degrees, you will have defeated the purpose of having so carefully attempted to serve the wine at a proper temperature.

Now then, what can you do if the red wine is too warm?

Well, if you haven’t poured or decanted it yet, refrigerate the bottle; or do as we do, we slip one of the wine bottle ice skirts over the bottle for 20 minutes of so, or, if possible, we’ll pour the wine into our glass then refrigerate the glasses till time to begin drinking the wine.

But, our most common correction method is to simply put an ice cube in the glass.

“Heretic!” you shout.

And in a sense you are correct putting that ice cube in the wine

But what if the red wine is too cold... and you’re in a hurry to get on with the drinking? gives one the general impression the offender lacks a certain amount of knowledge and savoir faire.

However, the actual facts are that the wine you are about to

drink, which is way too warm, is probably somewhat high alcohol… 14.5 percent ABV or higher.

All the ice cube does, in addition to aiding to lower the temperature of the wine in the glass, is add water to the wine. The result is an ever so slight reduction of alcohol in the glass.

But what if the red wine is too cold?

You’ve been putting that half bottle of red wine that was left after dinner into the refrigerator overnight to help keep the wine drinkable till next time you need a red.

That wine, coming out of the

May 2012 | The Good Life

refrigerator, is 40 degrees F, and that is way too cold.

You can, and should of course, remove the bottle from the refrigerator and allow the wine to come to drinking temperature before you drink it.

However, for those of you in a hurry to get on with the drinking of that super cold red wine, try this: pour the wine into your glass and put the glass of wine in the microwave and zap it to a more desirable temperature.

Yes, you do have to be careful or you’ll end up with a hot beverage.

Yet, I know one person, who

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habitually nukes his refrigerated leftover reds.

And, he hasn’t burned himself yet.

Alex Saliby is a wine lover who spends far too much time reading about the grapes, the process of making wine and the wines themselves.

He can be contacted at alex39@msn. com.

Know of someone stepping off the beaten path in the search for fun and excitement? E-mail us at editor@ncwgoodlife.com

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column GARDEN OF DELIGHTS

bonnie orr

Back from Belize with recipes in hand B

elize is beautiful, as I have recently discovered. The people are attractive and pleasant to visitors like me.

Many of them are a mixture of Mayan, black and Caucasian, 15 percent are pure Mayan who were the original people in the area.

Historical Mayan sites are spread throughout the country. The landscape is lush exotic flowers, trees, animals and birds.

Incongruously, the pine trees support orchid and bromeliads.

The food is Central American.

Small corn or flour tortillas are the bread. Beans, usually black beans, are served at nearly every meal. So is rice, which is cooked in coconut milk.

There is “beans and rice” when the rice and beans are served in separate lumps on the plate, and “rice and beans” when the two ingredients are cooked together.

Hot pepper sauce replaces ketchup and steak sauce. Fried platanos, the large, starchy banana is a common vegetable accompaniment.

A common breakfast bread, Fry Jacks, resembles a New Orleans’ Beignet without the powdered sugar.

Lime juice is squeezed fresh on salad greens, and that constitutes the entire dressing for a salad. That is a nice healthy alternative isn’t it?

Sugary, fresh watermelon, pineapple and papaya slices are readily available.

This tropical country produces vast vines and large, unusual trees. It is the home to what is known as Honduran mahogany because Belize was called British Honduras before 1981.

Allspice trees grow wild.

They have stately long slim,

white trunks and produce masses of little white fragrant flowers whose berries are the common spice. In the United States, we use allspice in sweet pastries to compliment cinnamon and nutmeg.

Allspice is used in savory dishes in Belize, and I have adapted one recipe we can cook here. It is a savory soup.

I slightly changed the herbs since we do not grow colAngie Webb of the Crooked Tree Lodge serves up landra and other traditional meals of Belize as well as travelers’ greens. Escabeche favorites. is prepared in many Spanish influenced is browned —about 30 minutes. This cuisines in a wide variety of adds a very distinctive taste to the recipes.

ESCABECHE

Serves 4-6. One hour 20 minutes preparation This dish is assembled differently, so follow the instructions for a truly tasty dish.

Ingredients: 1 three-pound chicken cut up 8 cups water 1 tablespoon oil 3 large onions sliced 3/4 cup vinegar 3 tablespoon chopped cilantro leaves 1 tablespoon fresh thyme 1 tablespoon fresh Oregano 2 whole small jalapeno peppers 2 whole cloves garlic 16 allspice berries Salt and pepper Boil the chicken until tender and remove the bones and skin. Throw away the skin. Save the stock!

Put the chicken and the bones in a baking dish with a bit of oil and bake at 400 degrees until the chicken meat

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meat.

Put the sliced onions in the vinegar to soak for 30 minutes while the chicken browns. Add a bit of water if the vinegar does not totally cover the onions.

Add the seasonings to the stock and boil gently for 10 minutes. Do not cut the jalapenos because this dish should just have a suggestion of hot pepper.

Add browned chicken and brown bits from the bones and all the juices.

Throw away the bones. (Set aside some of the meat for the next recipe, Boil-up dinner).

Add onion and vinegar.

Simmer 5 minutes.

Serve with a scoop of coconut rice to make a stew. The allspice berries are too woody to be eaten, so push them to the side of your plate.

Angie Webb at the Crooked Tree Lodge at the nature preserve shared this traditional dish she grew up eating in Crooked Tree Village.

Again the assembly is differ-

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| May 2012

ent. There are not any measurements because the cook uses what is available.

BOIL-UP DINNER

Serves 4. Preparation 40 minutes Boil these ingredients we can easily get in enough water to cover. Cook until veggies are still firm.

Cut into large chunks: 2 plantains 2 whole yams 2 sweet potatoes 2 chayote 3 carrots 3 corn on the cob Some cabbage leaves If you go to Seattle’s Uwajimaya, you can find taro root to add to this stew.

Fry in coconut oil: 2 sliced tomatoes 3 cloves garlic 3 large onions Salt and pepper Mix the fried ingredients into the boiled ones. Then add: One peeled whole boiled egg for each person 1/4 cup of baked heavily salted boneless chicken meat for each person. Use cooked chicken that you salt heavily and let sit for 20 minutes until the salt is dissolved and absorbed.

Coconut milk rice Serves 4. Preparation 30 minutes

2 cups rice — use your favorite type 1 3/4 cup water 2 cups coconut milk Dash of salt Cook rice in the liquids in the traditional manner. It takes about 25 minutes for the liquids to be absorbed and for the rice to become fluffy.

Bonnie Orr — the dirt diva — gardens and cooks in East Wenatchee.

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column THE TRAVELing DOCTOR

jim brown, m.d.

Should you screen for cancer or not?

Lately there have been sev-

eral articles in the news questioning whether or not certain cancer screening is harmful or of value.

It is hard for the general public to sift through these articles and come up with an educated approach to what is best for them.

Two primary controversies about screening involve the most common cancers — prostate cancer (the number one cancer in males) and breast cancer (the number one cancer in females).

When medical experts look at an issue such as screening, they look first at the benefits to society, the cost per life saved, the accuracy of screening and the effectiveness of the treatments available if cancer is discovered.

Mary is a 49-year-old Caucasian woman who went in for a routine complete physical exam. She feels healthy, drinks a glass of red wine daily, never smoked and had two children who were breastfed. She is mildly obese and moderately active. She wonders if she should have a mammogram. This is a dilemma.

Worldwide, breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed life-threatening cancer in women, and the second cause of cancer death in women after lung cancer.

Early breast cancer may be without symptoms and is often first detected as an abnormality on a mammogram before it can be felt. Such an abnormality generally leads to further testing and frequently a breast biopsy.

Improved screening can lead to an earlier diagnosis at stages amenable to surgical removal.

Although breast cancer inci-

dence has been rising, possibly due to better detection methods, breast cancer mortality has been decreasing due in part to screening and newer and more effective therapies, which is a good thing.

This all seems like good news to me — so what is the controversy?

The current lifetime risk of getting breast cancer in the U.S. is that one in every eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime.

The current controversy has to do with mammogram screening for women under the age of 50 and frequency of screening for all age groups. There can be false positives in mammogram screening that occur more often in younger females due to their denser breasts.

In Canada a decision was made advising against screening mammograms in women under age 50. Some criticized this decision as motivated primarily as a cost saving measure.

When the U.S. Preventive Task Force released its guidelines in 2009 advising against screening for breast cancer for women under the age of 50, it created a furor in the U.S. among many physicians and patients.

The task force recommended that screening in the 40-49 and over 75 age groups should be individualized, based on risk factors and, when done, it should be done every two years rather than every year as currently has been the case in all age groups.

The risk factors for breast cancer include an inherited breast cancer gene, a family history of breast cancer, having had therapeutic radiation to the chest at an age under 30, postmenopausal obesity, a sedentary life style and alcohol.

May 2012 | The Good Life

“There is controversy with self breast exams, but why not do them?

They are free and easy to do.”

I asked Mandy Robertson, MD oncologist at the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center, her views on this controversy.

She replied, “I recommend mammogram screening of the average risk woman to begin at age 40 with a mammogram every one to two years until age 50, then yearly based on recommendations from expert groups including the American Cancer Society, National Comprehensive Cancer Network, American Society of Clinical Oncology, the National Cancer Institute and the American College of Radiology.

“I also recommend an annual clinical breast exam by a healthcare practitioner every year starting at age 40, and regular monthly self-exams of the breasts.

“There is controversy with self breast exams, but why not do them? They are free and easy to do. I can think of numerous women who ‘found’ their own breast cancer because of routine self-exams.

“Once you get used to knowing how your breasts feel normally, it is much easier to find an abnormality. And, not all breast cancers are found on mammogram, although most are.

“Approximately one percent will not be seen and can only be felt. I encourage women to work on risk reduction strategies inwww.ncwgoodlife.com

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cluding regular exercise and good nutrition.

“These are important not only to decrease the risk of breast cancer but also other cancers, such as colon and prostrate cancers.”

Jack, a 51-year-old healthy and physically active man, finally comes in for his firstever physical exam at his wife’s insistence. He has no family history of cancer and he doesn’t smoke. He has no symptoms. Should he have a PSA done?

Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in males and the second most common cause of cancer death in males, again following lung cancer.

Recently, there have been many articles in the news questioning the usefulness of the routine PSA (prostate specific antigen) screening blood tests for prostate cancer.

One of the controversies comes from the fact that prostate cancer generally is slow growing, and thus many patients with prostate cancer will eventually die of unrelated causes.

In addition, treatment for prostate cancer, including surgery (radical prostatectomy), brachytherapy (radioactive seed therapy) and external radiation, are not without potential side effects. The most common side effects are impotency, incontinence and occasionally bowel problems.

In some medical centers there has been an increased interest in watchful waiting, which means once the cancer has been diagnosed to check the PSA

}}} Continued on next page

As a person who had prostate cancer surgery nearly eight years ago, it was difficult back then for me to know what the best decision was in my case. }}} Continued from previous page at regular intervals and to get biopsies on a regular schedule, thus leaving the decision of treatment until a significant change in these two occurs.

The decision regarding PSA screening for prostate cancer should be based on the preference of an informed patient.

The patient needs to know the limits of screening as well as the potential benefits and risks that go along with PSA screening.

In most studies, PSA screening for average risk men has not been shown to significantly improve overall survival from prostate cancer. The main prostate screening controversy involves persons with no symptoms who are considered to be of average risk.

Factors that increase the risk of prostate cancer are advanced age, a family history of prostate cancer in a father or sibling and of being of a black race.

The questions are, therefore, whether it is necessary to screen those of average risk, and if so, at what age should it start.

In January, the Journal of the National Cancer Institute published the results of a 13-year study of prostate cancer screening in over 76,000 men aged 55-74.

They found little evidence of a reduction of prostate cancer mortality from organized PSA screening. Thus, they conclude if it has benefit, it is very small and takes a long time to see it.

It has been shown that 30 percent of males over the age of 50 and 50 percent of men at age 70 who die without having been diagnosed with prostate cancer do actually have some prostate cancer cells at autopsy.

That number increases to 90 percent in men in their 90s who had died of other causes.

Since 3 percent of men die of prostate cancer, it suggests most men with prostate cancer might not need treatment.

Another recent study, however, compared men with early prostate cancer who were treated with a similar group of men not treated but who opted for watchful waiting and no treatment.

After six years, the death rate in the surgical group was 4.6 percent vs. 8.9 percent in the watchful waiting group, which on the other hand suggests treatment still would be preferred to doing nothing.

This did not take into account whether the cancer found on the biopsy was considered aggressive or not. If one has an elevated PSA and gets a biopsy, the pathologist can determine if it is an aggressive or less aggressive form of the cancer. One could make a case for watchful waiting in the less aggressive cancer, which might never be fatal.

No matter how you look at it, there are no clear-cut answers.

The biggest controversy in my mind about prostate cancer is whether or not to do PSA screening at all under the age of 65 in average risk males.

If it is done and cancer is found, what then is the best treatment to embark upon depending on the aggressiveness of the cancer as determined by the pathologist?

This is a highly personal decision that needs to be made individually, discussing it with your doctors and weighing all the available factors.

Hopefully current research will help in the future to identify those who are of low, average or high risk to better define who

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needs possibly no monitoring, monitoring with close observation or who merit more aggressive treatment.

I asked Joe Pazona, WVMC urologist who does robotic prostatectomies, his take on this subject.

Dr. Pazona said, “Given the current state of our knowledge, PSA screening, despite its limitations, is still a valuable tool.”

Along with current American Urological Association guidelines, he advises screening to start at age 40 in African-American patients and those with a family history of prostate cancer. Otherwise he recommends PSA screening start at age 50 in average risk men. “Until a better test is developed, it is irresponsible to say that PSA is a useless test for all patients,” he said.

Although patient anxiety over PSA levels is a concern, Dr. Pazona sees little downside to screening compared to the alternative.

“Some of my unhappiest prostate cancer patients did not have a PSA checked by their doctor, and they went on to have an aggressive cancer.”

He warned that “the PSA test or a digital rectal exam cannot reliably predict if a patient has prostate cancer, so an office prostate biopsy is necessary to confirm the diagnosis. Until a prostate biopsy is performed, we cannot tell what type of a cancer a patient has.”

He added that, “Even then, there are no reliable tests to predict which patients will go on to develop complications or die of their prostate cancer. I try to take into consideration a patient’s age, medical problems, PSA levels and biopsy report when counseling patients on their treatment options.”

Dr. Pazona agreed that prostate cancer is probably overdiagnosed and at times overtreated. He said, “Ultimately, the patient must make an informed decision regarding treatment of his cancer that is right for him.”

As a person who had prostate

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| May 2012

cancer surgery nearly eight years ago, it was difficult back then for me to know what the best decision was in my case.

If I were making the decision today, I think personally, if I had no symptoms and had a very low-grade cancer on biopsy, I might opt for watchful surveillance.

My father had a non-aggressive form of prostate cancer that he took to his grave at age 96 without any symptoms or treatment. I had a very large prostate that was causing me a lot of symptoms, so I knew I had to do something.

The radiation therapist I consulted said that either seed therapy or external radiation would not help and might worsen my symptoms from my enlarged prostate. This made my decision somewhat easier.

Those bothersome symptoms are now gone.

Recently, I read an article stating that the vast majority of deaths from prostate cancer following surgery occur in the first five years. This was encouraging to me.

After prostate surgery, a PSA is routinely done each year to determine whether the cancer has returned. The urology researcher in the article stated that after 10 years post op, there is little further need for routine PSA follow-up tests, as the risk of death from prostate cancer is extremely low at that point.

I am keeping my fingers crossed. I know that my friends, who also have had this cancer, always worry when they have their annual PSA done. I would welcome stopping that test after two more years.

Being a cancer survivor has given me a much stronger appreciation for each day that I have.

I like how my mom always said, “Just live for today.”

Jim Brown, M.D., is a retired gastroenterologist who has practiced for 38 years in the Wenatchee area. He is a former CEO of the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center.

ARTS &

entertainment

Improv/Acting Workshop, 5/1, 7 p.m. Every Tuesday night with theater games for novice and experienced players. Fun, causal and free. Riverside Playhouse. Info: mtow.org.

Wall art in very fine detail

for exceedingly fine detail. Page 33

Wall muralist Patti Erikson paints with a small brush

Butterflies, bugs & blooms Looking for a pretty

Cooking Class, 5/1, 5:30 p.m.

Artichoke and lemon Fritto Misto, fennel and orange salad, Italianstyle braised pork shoulder and sausages with warm pasta and Arugula in sauce, sautéed spinach, currants and pine nuts, orange scented Pistachio Cake with crème Fraische and chocolate shavings.

The Ivy Wild Inn. Cost: $40. Info: 293-5517.

nature walk? Phil Archibald leads an exploration of full-blown spring glory on Stormy Creek Preserve Saturday, May 12, from 9 a.m. to noon. Learn about spring wildflowers, songbirds, and butterflies along the Entiat River.

Info: cdlandtrust.org.

Mission: Improv, 5/3, 7 p.m. & every Thursday. Free open workshop, theater games for novice and experienced players. Fun and casual. Riverside Playhouse. Info: www.mtow.org.

Cinco de Mayo, 5/4, 5 – 8 p.m.

Themed activities, entertainment, view arts and artists, savor tasty treats and meals. Downtown Chelan. Cost: free. Info: lakechelan. com.

Gallery 4 South, 5/4, 5 – 8 p.m.

Wenatchee artist Diana Sanford will be featured. Whether working in pastel or oil, abstract or representational, Diana’s work reflects her love for the outdoors. Enjoy the art, conversation and hors d’oeuvres. Cost: free.

Wenatchee First Fridays, 5/4, 5 p.m. – 8 p.m. Walk downtown for art, music, dining and entertainment. Downtown Wenatchee.

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Wenatchee Farmer’s Market opens The first local

farmer’s market of the season opens Saturday, May 19, 8 a.m. - 1 p.m. Bakery items, farm fresh eggs, homemade fruit smoothies, homemade soy candles, wood work, mosaic art, local fruits and vegetables and more. Palouse and Columbia.

Info: wenatcheefarmersmarket.com.

May 2012 | The Good Life

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Photo from WenatcheeOutdoors.org

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WHAT TO DO

We want to know of fun and interesting local events. Send info to: donna@ncwgoodlife.com

}}} Continued from previous page 2 Rivers Art Gallery, 5/4, 5 – 8 p.m. Wine, refreshments and live music. Featured artist William F. Reese. 102 N Columbia, Wenatchee.

Cost: free.

Bavarian Battle, 5/5, 9 a.m. A 5k-obstacle run with mud, foam snow, climbing, crawling and hopping around Leavenworth Ski Hill recreation trails. Info: skileavenworth.com.

Growling Old Men, 5/5, 7:30 p.m.

Ben Winship and John Lowell from the Northern Rockies are versed in traditional music. Cashmere Community Coffeehouse. Cost: $3 at the door and pass the hat for the musicians Info: 548-1230 or cashmerecoffeehouse.com.

Corey McDougall Memorial Golf Tournament & dinner, 5/6, 11 a.m. Shotgun start 1 p.m.

Proceeds go to Mission Ridge Ski Education Foundation. Highlander Golf Course. Cost: $125 or $450 foursome. Price includes 18 holes of golf, cart, dinner and awards.

Register: mrst.us.

Underground Blues Jam, 5/7, 7:30 - 10 p.m. Open blues jam every first Monday of the month. 10 Below, 29 N. Columbia side B. Info: Joe Guimond 664-4077.

Alzheimer’s Café, 5/8, 2:30 p.m.

– 4 p.m. Mountain Meadows Senior Living Campus hosts a café the second Tuesday of every month.

This is a casual setting for folks with Alzheimer’s, Dementia, their loved ones and caregivers. Desserts and beverages will be served free of charge. Entertainment and activities for those wishing to participate. 320 Park Avenue, Leavenworth. Info: 548-4076. eBay: The Basics of Selling, 5/10, 6 p.m. Learn how to set up an eBay seller account, create successful eBay listings, upload pictures and accept credit card payments with PayPal. Included are selling tips, tricks and the traps to avoid. Taught by published eBay author Kevin W. Boyd. WVC Wenatchi Hall, room 2207. Cost: $49. Info: 682-6900 or ced.wvc.edu.

Manson Apple Blossom Festival, 5/11- 5/12. Kiwanis breakfast 6:30 – 10 a.m. in the basement of the Grange on Saturday followed by parade. Quilt show at the grange.

Info: lakechelan.com.

Apple Blossom fun Antique Car Club Display, 5/5, noon – 4 p.m. Most of the antique automobiles carrying dignitaries in the Grand Parade will be on display in the parking lot of the Museum right after the parade.

Xanadu, 5/3-5, 10-12 & 17-19, 7:30, 5/12 & 19, 2 p.m. Musical spoof directed by Paul Atwood. Riverside Playhouse. Info: appleblossom.org.

93 Years of Apple Blossom Festival Royalty, 4/28- 5/6.

See photographs and memorabilia of past Apple Blossom Festival Royalty from 1920 through today.

Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center. Cost: $5 adults, $4 seniors, $2 children 6-12, under 6 free. Info: wvmcc.org.

Food Fair and Entertainment, 4/28 - 5/6. Memorial Park corner of Orondo St and Chelan Ave. Info: appleblossom.org.

Wine-Apple-Oosa, 5/5, 1 – 5 p.m.

Wine garden and outdoor concert.

Enjoy 12 tastes of local wines.

Performing Arts Center Plaza at 123 N. Wenatchee Ave. Cost: $20.

Info: Jan Lutz 669-5808.

a.m. – 11:30 a.m., 1 – 4 pm. & 7 -10 p.m. Sunday, 10 a.m. – noon. Vale Elementary School, Cashmere.

Free to watch or $30 to dance.

Funtastic Shows Carnival, 4/28 – 5/6. Wide array of rides and games for all ages. Open 5 p.m. weekdays and noon on weekends. Wenatchee Riverfront Park.

No gate fees.

GS Long Bull Riding Blowout, 5/4 – 5, 7 p.m. Over 35 cowboys and bulls, mutton bustin, cowboy poke and more. Town Toyota Center. Cost: $25. Info: towntoyotacenter.com.

Ride the Miniature Train, 4/28 – 5/5, 1 p.m. – 6 pm. Take your family for a special ride on the little train that runs on a 10-inchgauge track in scenic Riverfront Park.

3 on 3 Basketball Tournament, 5/5, 9 a.m. – 8 p.m. 5/6, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m. Walla Walla Point Park. Info: Paul Floyd 264-7663.

All-Service Club Luncheon, 5/2, noon. Wenatchee Convention Center. Cost: $20. Info: appleblossom.org.

Golf Tournament, 5/3, 9:30 a.m. Awards, raffles and more.

Highlander Golf Course. Info: 6623616.

Classy Chassis Parade, 5/4, 6:30 p.m. Parade starts at Eastmont Community Park in East Wenatchee travels down Grant Road turns right on Valley Mall Parkway. Cost: free.

Arts and Crafts Fair, 5/4 – 6, 10 a.m. – 7 p.m. 11 a.m. – 5 pm. on Sunday. Over 100 talented artists, musicians and crafters. Festival souvenirs: t-shirts, sweatshirts, youth apparel, hats, jewelry, pins, art prints and more. Memorial Park.

Square Dance, 5/4 – 5/6, Friday 7 p.m. – 10 p.m., Saturday, 10

Breaking the Code: Write Your Family History, 5/11, 7 p.m.

A presentation by Karen FisherAlaniz. Leavenworth Library. Cost: free. Info: abookforallseasons.com.

Spring Fling Barn Dance, 5/11, 7 p.m. A fun night of square dancing

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Kiwanis Pancake Breakfast, 5/5, 6:30 - 10:30 a.m. All you can eat pancakes, eggs, juice, milk and coffee. Triangle Park. Cost: $5 in advance or $6 at the gate. Each ticket is an entry for a $500 gas giveaway. Info: Tom Irvin 6620200.

Grand Parade, 5/5, 11 a.m.

Parade starts at Triangle Park runs down Orondo, turns left on Mission St. Apple Blossom Run, 5/5, 9:40 a.m. Runners have a choice of four events: 1 Mile Kids Run for grades 1-8; 5K Run, 10K Run and 5K Walk.

All events start at the Apple Bowl and follow the parade route down Orondo Street and Wenatchee Avenue. The 5K and 10K events cross the pedestrian bridge on First Street and continue north along the riverfront. The Kids Run finishes in front of the Convention Center on Wenatchee Ave. and the longer events finish at the Linden Tree area at the foot of 9th St. Info: Steph Grubich 663-8711. and tunes featuring old-time favorites with Nettle Honey. Canyon Wren Recital Hall at Icicle Creek for the Arts. Cost: $5 adults, $3 children. Info: icicle.org.

Maifest, 5/11 – 5/13. Flowers, music, entertainment, Maibaum

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| May 2012

Super Oval, 5/5, 5 p.m. Season opener 200 lap Big 5 Super Late Models, Thunder Cars and Pure Stock. Wenatchee Valley Super Oval, East Wenatchee. Cost: $16 adults, $22 students and seniors, $4 children 6-12, under 12 free.

Info: wvso.com.

Lights, Camera, Fashion, 5/5, 7 p.m. Red Lion Hotel. Cost: $30 general, $45 VIP. A portion of the proceeds go to Solomon’s Porch.

Info: 663-0711.

Sonia Dawkins: Prism Dance Theatre, 5/5, 7 p.m. Local dancers Briar Hoper (Leavenworth), Ashley Leneway (Wenatchee), Andrea Locke (Wenatchee), Anna James Miller (Wenatchee), Caitlin Marshall (Leavenworth), Hannah Rice (Leavenworth), and Carlo Tanne (Wenatchee) will join Prism Dance Theatre company members from Seattle and New York City to perform stunning and dynamic contemporary dance pieces choreographed by Ms. Dawkins.

Performing Arts Center. Cost: $15 adults, $12 senior and student. At the door: $18.

Apple Pie and Dessert BakeOff, 5/6. Pies and desserts will be accepted from 10 – 11 a.m. at the Festival Office. Cash prizes for the top three pies and top three desserts. Awards announced at 2 p.m. in Memorial Park.

Apple Pie Eating Contest, 5/6, 2 p.m. Two age divisions; 8-12 and 13-17 with a boys and girls category in each. Prize money up to $100 to the winner in each age division. Info: appleblossom.org.

dances, grand parade. Downtown Leavenworth. Info: leavenworth. com.

Butterflies, bugs & blooms at Stormy Creek, 5/12, 9 a.m.

– noon. Phil Archibald leads this exploration of full-blown spring

>>

WHAT TO DO

We want to know of fun and interesting local events. Send info to: donna@ncwgoodlife.com

glory on Stormy Creek Preserve.

Learn about spring wildflowers, songbirds, and butterflies along the Entiat River. Info: cdlandtrust.org.

Website today, profit tomorrow, 5/12, 9 a.m. – 3 p.m. This class provides a step-by-step road map to easily create your own website for fun, hobbies or business.

Taught by published author Kevin Boyd. WVC Wenatchi Hall, room 2207. Cost: $99. Info: 682-6900 or ced.wvc.edu.

Book Buzz, 5/12, 1 p.m. Meet authors Lanette Taylor, Jerry Smith, Betty Wilsey, Karen Fisher-Alaniz and Herb Leonard and win prizes. A Book for All Seasons, Leavenworth.

Info: abookforallseasons.com.

Remembering the Songs, 5/12, 7:30 p.m. A short film about the American Indian flute traditions of the American Southwest and Northwest will follow live music and questions with Gary Stroutsos, W.K. Kellogg Foundation recipient.

Cost: $15. Info: icicle.org.

Tea with Teddy, 5/12, 3 p.m. This is a tea party planned by kids with kids in mind. Bring your own doll or stuffed animal and mingle with Walt the Wolf, Schroeder Bear and the panther and wildcat mascots from Wenatchee and Eastmont high schools. Enjoy delicious treats and beverages while watching live entertainment, including a stuffed animal pageant. Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center. Cost: $12. Info: wvmcc.org.

Celebration of the Bells, 5/12, 7 p.m. Wenatchee Valley Appleaires will perform along with the Marlin Ringers, the Ambassadors of Ephrata and the Agape Bell Ringers.

Performing Arts Center. Cost: $15.

Info: pacwen.org.

Geology Bus Tour, 5/12, 7:45 a.m. Bureau of Land Management geologist Brent Cunderla will point out evidence of the glacial history of the Lake Chelan area: ice lobes, moraines, melt water channels, erratics, terrace levels, haystack rocks and more. The bus will travel the west side of the Columbia to Navarre Coulee, Chelan and Manson – then return along the east side where features of the Ice Age Floods can be seen. Wear comfortable shoes, bring water, and plan on purchasing lunch at a local winery.

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The Art Life

// SKETCHES OF LOCAL ARTISTS

Wall muralist started small... very, very small A small copse of winter as-

pens glows in the late sun, with curious goldfinches, a scattering of rough-barked pine trees, and bowed grasses adding texture to the pale welcoming branches of the forest.

This is not a walk in the woods. This is the full wall, floor to ceiling, of a Leavenworth home that’s currently being graced with the artistry of local muralist Patti Erikson.

She devotes 25 hours every week to this mural. In January, she sketched her first quick lines to orient tree trunks and branches in the space and will make her last brushstroke by summer.

With luck, Patti’s naturalistic aspen wood will span the life of its host house. Though there isn’t a wide audience for most of the private murals she has done, she says of those special in-home projects, “I love the appreciation and friendships I have developed along the way.”

Muralists work in distinctive environments, rarely at home, sometimes outside, often with onlookers. And Patti’s job of re-creating on huge flat surfaces the beauty of nature, including well-researched varieties of bird life, creates some physical challenges.

Whether her commission is a bank building, a bathroom or a bistro, she’s often found teetering on a tall scaffold or ladder, acrylic paint tin in one hand, brush in the other. Then there are awkward postures like straddling a kitchen sink for hours, or, as she described, “Painting up close to the ceiling with your head and shoulders jammed into a corner.”

Physical challenge has always May 2012 | The Good Life

She now laughs at the folly — years of scrimshaw and the habit of minute perfection were fully ingrained in her, so even the biggest murals are filled with intricate detail. Some are made with brush bristles a quarter of an inch long on a base only 1/16 inch wide.

Tiny. Murals brought her no respite from exactitude.

But because her childhood art for years was decidedly equine-centric — horses posed, wild and running — it’s no coincidence that the rigors of her A great horned owl gazes down from a realistic meticulous and bodybranch in O’Grady’s Pantry, part of Patti Erikson’s bending art are very first local mural-scape. deliberately balanced by spending rewarding hours in the saddle. been a factor in Patti’s art. Not She manages a small ranch since her fine arts degree from specializing in Icelandic horses Central Washington University next to her home and spends has she luxuriated in a studio what she calls “therapy time” with a stool and an upright easel. For 30 years she did fine-line riding, getting away from the brushes and the endless walls, close-up work, bent over like a moving fast forward up mounwatchmaker as she delved into tain trails at a rhythmic gait. the art of scrimshaw.

Outdoors, free and balanced, On shards and cross sections she recuperates easily. of creamy white animal tusks, Patti is hoping to transition she meticulously carved scenes to some studio work, creating with an Exacto blade and then paintings “that I can actually do filled in with ink or oil paint.

(No new tusks were used in this on my own time, and then pick up and transport to different process — only found remains places,” she says (places like galof mastodons and mammoths, leries, and buyers’ homes). And most collected at mine sites.) she’ll continue with her “Empty She found a collector’s market Bowls” contributions to Upper for her exquisite pieces both Valley MEND. here and in Alaska, where she No matter where or what the lived and raised her family for 15 subject, Patti hopes to ply her years. vocation of re-creating reality Imagine her joy when the with paint for as long as she can. family moved to Leavenworth and she accepted her first mural She declared, “If you’re an artist, you just have to create. Art is commission. Patti remembers like breathing. You have to make thinking, “Hurray! I can fiart.” nally work big and bold, move — by Susan Lagsdin around!” www.ncwgoodlife.com

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WHAT TO DO

We want to know of fun and interesting local events. Send info to: donna@ncwgoodlife.com

}}} Continued from previous page Advance reservations are required 888-6240. Meet at Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center.

Info: wvmcc.org.

Clark Kernney Kid Day Fishing Party, 5/13, 1 – 4 p.m. Three fish limit with prizes for kids ages 1 to 14. Bring your own fishing gear and bait. Lake Chelan Golf Course Pond.

Cost: free. Info: lakechelan.com.

Homemade Pizza Night, 5/15, 5:30 p.m. Cooking class includes: classic Caesar salad, pizza and too easy tiramisu. The Ivy Wild Inn. Cost: $40. Info: 293-5517.

Sesame Street Live, 5/15, 7 p.m., 5/16, 10:30 a.m. & 7 p.m. Town Toyota Center. Info: towntoyotacenter.com.

Stuart Little, 5/15, 6:30 p.m.

Stuart is a little mouse, born to real human parents in New York City.

In this E. B. White fantasy, Stuart enjoys adventures in Central Park and then tries to rescue his friend Margalo, a beautiful bird, from the pursuit of Snowbell, their house cat. Performing Arts Center. Cost: $20 adults, $17 senior, $15 students. Info: pacwen.org.

Eating local, eating healthy, 5/16 & 5/23, 6 p.m. Are you confused about what makes a healthy diet? Do you know what to feed your family to give them the best nutrition? Focusing on seasonal and local foods, learn how to get the most out of your food and where to find local, healthy resources.

Find out how to make healthy food choices that will give your family the best nutritional advantage possible. Take home recipes to guide you at home. WVC Wenatchi Hall, room 2207. Cost: $39. Info: ced. wvc.edu.

Spring Bird Fest, 5/17 – 5/20. 40 field trips around the Leavenworth area, from mountains to sage.

Includes kids’ activities. Info: 5485807.

Beginning Genealogy in the Digital Age, 5/17 & 5/24, 6:30 p.m. Learn about collecting, recording, using the best software and much more to make the most of the new tools genealogists now have at their disposal. WVC Sexton Hall, room 6008. Cost: $49. Info: 682-6900 or ced.wvc.edu.

Wenatchee Farmer’s Market opens, 5/19, 8 a.m. - 1 p.m. Bakery items, farm fresh eggs, homemade fruit smoothies, homemade soy candles, wood work, mosaic art, local fruits and vegetables and more. Palouse and Columbia. Info: wenatcheefarmersmarket.com.

Lake Chelan Lion’s Club Golf Tournament, 5/18, 8:15, registration, shotgun 9:30 a.m. Enjoy 18 holes of golf with one or two Seahawk celebrities and the Seagals.

Bear Mountain Ranch Golf Course.

Cost: $100 includes golf cart, lunch, two beverage tickets. Info: lakechelan.com.

Feathers: The Evolution of a Natural Miracle, 5/18, 7 p.m.

Book signing. Author Thor Hanson, biologist, integrates the research of paleontologists, ornithologists, biologists, engineers, and even art historians into a sweeping natural history, showing how feathers have been used to fly, protect, attract, and adorn across centuries and across the globe. Tierra Learning & Retreat Center, Leavenworth. Cost: free. abookforallseasons.com.

Spring Barrel Tasting and Open House, 5/18 – 20, noon - 5 p.m. Talk with the winemakers and sample tastes of wines from the barrel before bottling. Enjoy food and wine. Participating wineries in Wenatchee, East Wenatchee, Quincy, Malaga, Cashmere, Leavenworth and Orville. 2464 Twin Peaks View, East Wenatchee. Info: wenatcheewines.com.

Write on the River, 5/18 – 5/20.

Seventh annual writing conference.

2012 keynote speaker is Jonathan Evison, whose book West of Here just won the prestigious 2012 Pacific Northwest Book Award.

This conference has something for writers of all interests, genres and abilities. Enjoy a full weekend of workshops, literary agent appointments, a young writers session and a new members-only Friday session. Wenatchee Valley College.

Info: writeontheriver.org Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Banquet, 5/19, 5 p.m. The Colockum Chapter of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation will hold a banquet and auction to raise funds for this well-known conservation organization that protects and enhances habitat for elk and other wildlife. Chelan County Fairgrounds, Cashmere. Info: 663-2419.

CASA Rock n’ Rowl Bowl-athon, 5/19, 2 p.m. Put together a bowling team of five and play one

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hour. Proceeds go to abused and or neglected children who have been removed from their homes. Eastmont Lanes, East Wenatchee. Info: Arlene Grover 662-7350.

Bikers Against Child Abuse 100 Mile Ride, 5/19, 9:30 a.m. Proceeds raised to help local abused children. Registration and ride starts at Bikerstown USA, 1016 Crescent St. Wenatchee. Cost: $15 passenger & $5 rider. Info: 6796277.

Concert V – Classical Favorites, 5/19, 7 p.m. Wenatchee Valley Symphony Orchestra and vocalist Elizabeth Zharoff will perform.

Performing Arts Center. Cost: $20 adults, $10 students, $25 balcony.

Info: wenatcheesymphony.org.

Spring Barrel Tasting, 5/19 – 5/20. Be the first to sample Lake Chelan Wine Valley’s notyet-released wines straight from the barrel. Various locations. Info: lakechelanwinevalley.com.

Songbird Concert, 5/20, 2 p.m.

Marlin Handbell Choir, Michael Carlos and Sally Singer’s students will perform. Canyon Wren Recital Hall, Leavenworth. Info: icicle.org.

West of Here, 5/20, 1:30 p.m. In the mythic town of Point Bonita, 19th Century settlers set out to build a dam, and 100 years later their descendants want to demolish it to bring back fish runs—but wait, there’s more; much, much more. An epic western adventure wrapped in the history of one small town. Author Jonathan Evision will be at the Wenatchee Library. Cost: free. Info: abookforallseasons.com.

www.ncwgoodlife.com

| May 2012

Nightclub Gentlemen: The Rat Pack Returns, 5/21, 7:30 p.m. A musical comedy about three Rat Packers and their quest for Vegas stardom full of martini music and hijinks. Starring Richard Gray, David Koch and David Silverman. Dress in ‘60s and win a prize. Canyon Wren Recital Hall, Leavenworth. Cost: $25. Info: icicle.org.

The Compassionate Friends, 5/21, 7 p.m. Support group meeting for those who have lost a child or grandchild. Grace Lutheran Church.

Info: Carol 665-9987.

Revitalize WA, 5/22- 5/24. This conference will feature a variety of sessions and tours relating to the revitalization of historic communities and resources. Economics expert Michael Schuman will speak 5/23. A silent auction will also take place. Campbell’s Resort, Chelan.

Info: Cindy Salazar 682-4322.

Chelan Valley Memorial Parade, 5/24. Honoring soldiers and police officers who lost their lives while in the line of duty. Downtown Chelan. Info: lakechelan.com.

Spring Serenade, 5/26, 7:30 p.m.

Works to include Beethoven Sonata No. 5 in F Major, Op.25 Spring for violin and piano Brahms Sonata No. 1 in G Major, Op. 78 for violin and piano Jennifer Caine, violin Oksana Ezhokina, piano. Canyon Wren Recital Hall, Leavenworth. Cost: $20 adults, $16 seniors, $8 students.

Info: icicle.org.

Quincy Kites & Chutes Festival, 5/25 – 5/18. This event offers education, training classes and flying of powered parachutes. Venue for

>>

The Art Life

WHAT TO DO

We want to know of fun and interesting local events. Send info to: donna@ncwgoodlife.com

kite flying, too. Parties on the Green at Twin Firs Turf, Quincy. Cost: free.

Info: partiesonthegreen.com Cooking Class, 5/29, 5:30 p.m.

Soups, salad and sandwich. Ivy Wild Inn. Cost: $40. Info: theivywildinn@mac.com.

Chelan Evening Farmer’s Market, 5/31 and every Thursday, 4 – 7 p.m. Expect tomatoes, peppers, herbs, plums, peaches, cherries, apples, the unexpected: hummus, goat cheese, lavender and other flowers, gooseberries, currants and wool. Entertainment too. Riverwalk Park, downtown Chelan. Info: lakechelan.com.

Cruizin Chelan, 6/1 – 2. Classic and muscle cars, street rods and pickups. Downtown Chelan. Info: cruizinchelan.com.

Bavarian Bike & Brew Festival, 6/2. IMBA sanctioned XC bike. Info: dasradhaus.com.

Leavenworth Wine Walk, 6/2, 1 – 7 p.m. Enjoy tasting local wines while strolling through shops, galleries and restaurants in downtown Leavenworth. Cost: $30 pp/ $60 couples. Info: visitwashingtonfarms.com.

Naturalist Hike at Horse Lake, 6/2, 8 a.m. – noon. Neal Hedges will lead an exploration of the habitats and wildlife of the Horse Lake Reserve. The property is home to many different reptiles, mammals, birds and plant species. Neal will lead the group on a search for species and offer insight on their behaviors and habitat. Info: cdlandtrust.org.

The Live for Adventure Race, 6/2, 1 p.m. A community adventure stage race with three stages.

Cardio (bike), sports/games and, strength/agility (obstacle course).

Participants can win money for any school club, sport or activity.

Three member teams race in the Wenatchee Apple Bowl. Kids and adults welcome. Seats for viewing and concessions available. Info: www.live4adventure.org.

Know of someone stepping off the beaten path in the search for fun and excitement? E-mail us at editor@ncwgoodlife.com

// SKETCHES OF LOCAL ARTISTS

Fast learner in an ever-changing digital video world

S

ometimes one good day job and a smart boss can set in motion a whole career, and “videographer plus” Brett McGinnis is a testament to that kind of good fortune.

Without a resume of art, film, or technology pursuits, in the last 12 years he’s learned a skill set that came to him with surprising ease, earned his way in a many-faceted and competitive art form and traveled farther then he ever dreamed.

Brett, 38, credits his mentor, M&M Production’s Malcolm Keithly, with his success. He says, with little exaggeration, “When I started working for him, I didn’t know how to turn on a computer, or where the lens was on a camera. He taught me everything I know.”

He’s learned so much that, he insists, “I never watch Hollywood movies anymore. I am just too critical! I love this stuff too much... every angle, every shadow — my eyes are all over the place.”

The year he started working in media, 1999, video was king.

Brett progressed fast and well, creating industrial and commercial promotional videos and stock footage.

But it wasn’t all about commercials. Ten years later, production partners and a great concept lead Brett to China and the Philippines on a rare filming opportunity to explore martial arts and its related traditions.

“The most fulfilling project I’ve ever done. It was an honor,” he said, “to help tell the story of an art form people feel so strongly

May 2012 | The Good Life

Brett McGinnis at the Great Wall of China: Video art has taken him far.

“The most fulfilling project I’ve ever done. It was an honor...” about.”

And the storytelling itself was honored.

In May 2011 at the prestigious New York International Independent Film and Video Festival, two of the videos born of Brett’s shoot were lauded as best documentaries in their category: Martial Arts: Secret of the Asian Masters (sports) and Lost Secret of Immortality (spirituality).

Ironically, after that exploration of ancient Asian enlightenment, Brett’s work with complex technology that’s constantly upgrading itself went into high speed. Digitalization, the Internet and social networking have avalanched TV commercials and promo slideshows into motion graphic novels, smart phone applications, iPad tablets, Facebook, websites, YouTube, blogs. ”There’s been more change in this business in the last two years than in my first 10 years here,” Brett says.

With all the changes, the basics of camera work still matter. www.ncwgoodlife.com

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The establishing shot that sets the tone and direction of the piece, then all the carefully chosen scenes that fulfill the script (which could be 100 pages long) are all within Brett’s purview.

In commercial art, money does buy time to do any job better. What if he could take as much time as he wanted on each piece? Here’s a filmmaker’s spin: “Time buys light,” Brett said enigmatically.

Then he explained, “With time you can choose the precise hour of the day, even the season for your best shots. Get the sun at the right angle…” He’s wistful now, “Or, you can hire a crew to bring in just the right lighting equipment.”

Technology allows an artist to touch a million people worldwide in a split second, and it lets Brett work with camera and computer mostly right here in the Wenatchee Valley. That’s a good thing for a family man.

And, there’s a big bonus. He said eagerly, “This is a perfect place to make films: there are so many dramatic landscapes right around here and in the region, from the coast to the desert — it’s easy to capture fantastic shots.”

— by Susan Lagsdin

>>

column those were the days

rod molzahn

First whites came for fur & the flag It was the fur trade in bea-

ver pelts that brought the first non-Indians to the upper Columbia River, North Central Washington and to the P’squosa (Wenatchi) Indians.

Spanish and British ships had begun exploring the Northwest coast in the early 1500s. As they sailed along the coast, the ships entered sheltered bays to meet and trade with Indians.

They exchanged nails, knives, kettles and other metal goods along with cloth, ribbon and buttons for fresh meat, fish and furs — primarily the prized sea otter and beaver.

In 1792 on his second voyage to the Northwest coast, American captain and trader Robert Gray brought his ship across a bar and into the mouth of a great river. He sailed 13 miles upstream trading with the Indians.

Before sailing out Captain Gray drew a chart of what he had seen and named the river for his ship, the Columbia.

By 1801 more than a dozen American ships were making regular stops along the coast on trading voyages that took them on to China then back to either the U.S. East Coast or to Europe.

(Lewis and Clark’s) purposes were exploration, establishing the United States’ claim to the West and laying the groundwork for an American fur trade that would reach across the continent.

In 1805 Meriwether Lewis and William Clark brought the Corps of Discovery across the Bitterroot Mountains to the Snake River then down the lower Columbia to the Pacific. Their purposes were exploration, establishing the United States’ claim to the West and laying the groundwork for an American fur trade that would reach across the continent.

Though Clark explored the Columbia for 10 miles above its confluence with the Snake River, it would be six more years before white men reached the upper

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river and the Wenatchee Valley.

In July of 1811 David Thompson, explorer and surveyor for the North West Fur Company in Canada, put his cedar plank canoe into the Columbia River at Kettle Falls in northeast Washington State.

With Thompson in the canoe were three French Voyagers (paddlers), two Iroquois Indians from eastern Canada and two San Poil Indians to translate the Salish spoken by people along the upper Columbia.

The party’s goal was to explore the length of the Columbia River to its mouth at the Pacific Ocean and determine its potential as a route to transport furs from western Canada to ships at the coast.

Thompson also intended to claim the country he passed through for England. He carried a British flag to place at the mouth of the Columbia to support his claim.

Thompson stopped and met with many Indian bands along the river including the Okanogans, Methows and Yakimas but he did not stop at the Wenatchee River confluence.

He did spend some time with a group of Sinkowarsin people at Cabinet Rapids below Rock Island. These were most likely

www.ncwgoodlife.com

| May 2012

Sinkiuse/ Columbia, a large tribe with villages at Rock Island and below who were later led by Chief Moses.

Thompson’s first goal was realized. He proved that the Columbia was navigable along its entire length and, in fact, traders and trappers transported furs and supplies up and down the river for the next 25 years.

His second goal proved to be illusive. When he reached the lower Columbia, below the Snake confluence, Thompson began hearing talk from Indians about white men at the mouth of the river.

His hopes of claiming the country for Great Britain evaporated when he reached Point George, 12 miles from the river’s mouth and found a small fort flying the American flag.

The Tonquin, sailing from New York, had crossed the Columbia bar four months earlier on March 24, 1811, bringing 45 men, the first contingent of John Jacob Astor’s Pacific Fur Company.

Astor’s plan was to control the American fur trade from coast to coast.

All the beaver pelts taken west

“Here the Indians met us in great numbers and vied with each other in acts of kindness.” of the Rocky Mountains would be collected at the mouth of the Columbia for shipment to China where they commanded high prices.

Thompson and his crew stayed a week at Fort Astoria before starting back up the Columbia.

On July 23 they left Astoria along with nine men of the Pacific Fur Company who planned to establish a fort and trade house somewhere north along the river.

On Aug. 1, just below the rapids at The Dalles, Thompson and his men, in their lighter, faster canoe, left the party and went on ahead to the Snake River.

There he hung the British Flag on a post with a note claiming all the land to the north for England. From there he proceeded up the Snake to the Palouse country then overland to Spokane.

The Pacific Fur Company men continued up the Columbia in search of a location for the trade house.

On the 24th of August 1811 they reached the P’squosa River.

Alexander Ross, a clerk in the party, wrote of their meeting with the P’squosa people.

“Here the Indians met us in great numbers and vied with each other in acts of kindness.

Sopa, the chief, made us a present of two horses, and others offered some for sale. We purchased four, giving for each one yard of print (material) and two yards of red gartering …

“Sopa invited us to pass the day with him, which we did, and were highly gratified to see the natives hunt the wild deer on

horseback. Sopa and his tribe kept smoking, dancing and singing the whole night, and at every pause a loud and vociferous exclamation was uttered, denoting that they were happy now. The whites had visited their land, poverty and misery would no longer be known amongst them; we passed the night without keeping watch.”

The party eventually selected a spot on the Okanogan River near its confluence with the Columbia for their fort and trade house.

Alexander Ross remained in the Columbia District fur trade until 1823. He was in charge of Fort Okanogan through most of those years but often took on exploration journeys throughout North Central Washington and the Cascades.

He made regular trips up and down the Columbia that often took him through the home of the P’squosa people.

In April of 1814 Ross described the P’squosa as “friends” who came to his aid when he was threatened by Yakima Indians.

While Indians around them were hostile towards white people, the P’squosa’s friendship and trust towards them was noted and appreciated by others in following years including U.S. Navy Captain Charles Wilkes in 1841 and Army Colonel George Wright in 1856.

In 1858 the P’squosa helped a group of white miners escape who were being attacked by the Sinkiuse chief and his warriors from across the Columbia.

For this act of kindness, Army Captain J.J. Archer promised to increase the size of the reservation promised to them three years earlier, promises that were never kept.

Marketplace Animal Communication

Carpet Cleaning

Insurance

Magazines

Extra copies Fre For sh ide the as ho me

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Cover price: $3

THE doN’T WAIT PRoJECT ®

overcoming sadness with action plus GoLd FEVER!

Hastings, Caffé Mela, Wenatchee Food Pavilion, Martin’s Market Place, A Book for All Seasons, Walgreens & Mike’s Meats

Window Cleaners

Historian, actor and teacher Rod Molzahn can be reached at shake.speak@frontier.com. His third history CD, Legends & Legacies Vol. III - Stories of Wenatchee and North Central Washington, is now available at the Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center and at other locations throughout the area.

May 2012 | The Good Life

HoAmt

WENATCHEE VALLEY’S #1 MAGAZINE

www.ncwgoodlife.com

|

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>>

column TWEETS FROM THE BUSH

MATT RADFORD

A call to the ladies: ‘I’m here!’

A

s dawn breaks across Horan Nature Area, a male Redwinged Blackbird lights atop a cattail, spreads bold red, yellow and black wings, and sings his familiar “chonk-ker-eee.”

He is a familiar spring sight in the marsh, near the confluence of the Wenatchee and Columbia rivers. Many other birds help to usher in spring as they sing and call to attract mates or warn competitors to stay out of their territory.

Common Yellowthroats stay hidden but sing a repeated “witchy-witchy-witchy.”

The more plaintiff call of the Mourning Dove, “Ooo-AH-ooo,” is heard in overhead trees. In May, the marsh comes alive with bird activity.

This great level of bird activity is the highlight of bird watching for me. As I walk around the many ponds and cattails patches on a May morning, I hear and see many wonderful species of birds.

They are busy making preparations for a spring and summer

A Red winged Blackbird sings in the morning. Photo by Matt Radford

in the Wenatchee Valley. Some have traveled thousands of miles to nest right here. In total, over 230 species of birds have been encountered at the Horan Nature Area.

The Red-winged Blackbird, who always captures much of my attention, has multiple female mates. Males may have 10 to 15 females nesting on their territories.

Males fiercely defend their

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| The Good Life

territories during the breeding season, spending more than a quarter of daylight hours in territory defense. He chases other males out of the territory and gives warning calls to potential nest predators; sometimes warning much larger animals, including pets and people.

The Wenatchee Valley provides many opportunities to view a variety of beautiful birds.

I look forward to every oppor-

www.ncwgoodlife.com

| May 2012

tunity to observe their many behaviors.

May this month of May find you enjoying them too.

Matt Radford is the owner of Mad Rooster Photography and Marketing and lives in East Wenatchee with his three children.

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