Travel

Broken Ankles and Shattered Bottles in Olympic National Park

An interesting introduction to the Pacific Northwest.

July of 2017 marked the beginning of my family’s month-long road trip, just as it did every summer.

That year’s route first took us from Wisconsin to San Francisco, CA on a long, straight-shot drive. We then spent the rest of the month meandering our way up the west coast until we finally reached Washington.

The first two and a half weeks of our trip featured no major hiccups (a rarity on these trips), and we arrived in Washington with high spirits.

We should have known that a smooth trip was too much to ask.

Shortly after arriving at our campsite in Olympic National Park, my parents took our cooler to the campground bathrooms for a rinse.

Cleaning the cooler required removing all the food and putting it (ideally) on a picnic table, but in this case on the sidewalk.

My mom is not exactly what I would call coordinated.

But what happened next was impressive, even for her.

While organizing the food on the sidewalk so it would be ready to go back into the cooler, a bottle of wine tipped and started rolling away.

My mom tried to catch it, but in her haste, she tripped. On a sidewalk crack.

She rolled her ankle and fell, hard, directly onto the wine bottle she had been chasing.

One broken ankle and one shattered wine bottle later, we were no longer wondering why this trip had been going so smoothly.

I’ve spent a lot of time on the road in my life, and one lesson I’ve learned over and over again is that things very rarely go as planned.

We have had tires nearly flying off our car, an ant colony in the engine, lost luggage, and so much more.

Each hiccup, malfunction, and detour has made those trips more memorable.

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