Wild Iris, WY, No. 2
A shortie on a new kind of family vacation, or, having fun with and without your kids on the same trip
The one part of this summer that hasn’t sucked was the time we spent in Wyoming climbing and camping in June— probably because it wasn’t truly summer yet, but whatever. It’s still appropriate that I go back and dwell in that goodness and see what else I can milk from it to share.1
We decided on Wild Iris as a destination this year because our younger son, Oren spent a couple of weeks there with friends last year after he graduated from high school. The photos we required him to send to us as proof of life made us drool. Brian and I had been to this part of WY before in 2017, but only for one day, and one of Oren’s photos reminded us why we needed to return and spend more time.
Brian and I would have gone out there on our own, but what solidified our plans was that both our boys and some of their friends were planning to go too, this year. Us-old-folks didn’t want to go with them/with them, but we thought it would be cool to be out there when they were out there and maybe run into them here and there. This sounded to me like a cool way to do a family vacation without doing a family vacation. It could be a new model for how to spend time off in the great outdoors, and maybe even climb, with our adult kids who don’t live at home anymore.
As I’ve written before, it’s important to me, and I hope at least a tiny bit to the rest of my family, that we continue to take trips together, to do things together outside of the norm, away from Pittsburgh. Especially now that we are Empty Nesting.2 Last summer, Oren went on his trip, but as a family, the only thing we could muster due to illness and bad weather was an overnight in Cleveland for a visit to the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame.
This summer needed to be different! We needed a good trip! And so our trip to Wild Iris came into being.
Along with the tantalizing photos from Oren’s trip last year, there were logistics that made us-old-folks going a necessity this time.
Here are the logistics:
Brian and I drove out first, leaving here six days in advance of the young men: Seb and Oren and three friends followed. Thankfully another set of parents, also wanting this trip to come to fruition, lent them their truck, so that a) there would be enough room for all of them and they wouldn’t smother each other, and b) Oren’s car wouldn’t fall apart and leave them stranded out there, and c) there would be space to bring another friend home along with all of his stuff from college. The plan for the young-folks was to stay in the Lander area climbing, camping, and cavorting for two weeks. Seb couldn’t stay as long as the others on account of work, so he planned to come back with us-old-folks earlier, giving the additional friend a space in the truck on the way back with the young-folks later.
The minutiae solidified around this scaffolding of time, and this is basically what we all pulled off. Success!
The minutiae is as follows:
The young men came up to climb at Wild Iris on their first full day in the Lander area. Brian and I had already been out climbing since the morning at The Erratic, where it was shady and cool, and were hiking over to the Main Wall when we spied the crew trudging across the meadow on the Aspen Glad trail, moving slowly in the sun and heat. It was a joy to see all of them there in person, finally.
When we caught up with them, we shared pleasantries, and they told us stories of their drive, and in general it was a pretty raucous meeting, as you can imagine it would be meeting up with six boisterous young men. They argued for a good bit and loudly about who was the most responsible— the ones who remembered to bring back packs with climbing gear, or the ones who remembered to bring food and water. Hmmm, safety vs. sustenance? Who’s to say?
When they began preparing to climb, and one of our sons pulled out his new rope, not yet flaked and completely tangled, from the giant blue Ikea bag he’d forced one of his friends to carry since he (the friend) had forgotten a backpack, we decided it best not to witness the shit-show of them climbing together and wandered on down the way to do some (quieter, more organized, possibly safer) climbing on our own. If we had stuck around, I might have shifted into the dreaded Mommy Mode, and nobody and no one wanted that. We prayed not to hear any hollers of dismay from them— a few, but not all, of them were seasoned-enough climbers, but none of them were very organized. We never did hear anything from them the rest of the day, so we assumed they’d been safe. Safe enough.3 On the hike back to camp, I picked up the trash that my son must not have seen laying in the dirt where they climbed. Ahem! I could act like a mom as long as my sons didn’t witness it.
Brian and I camped in the same campground with them for two nights, and that was enough. We gave them as much space as possible. We did not want to hamper, or really witness, their freedom. We spent just enough time with them. We watched them play round after ever-loving round of spike ball, posturing and shit-talking galore.
Probably my favorite thing was sitting around the fire with them after dinner, gabbing and bragging (some of us anyway) after the one day of climbing we spent together. One day of climbing with them was enough.
To be clear, I’m saying all of this with much affection. I love these guys, and I love hanging out with them. Brian and I enjoyed belaying some of them and listening to them harange and goad each other. At one point one of them challenged another, “If you can send this climb without falling, I’ll kiss you!” The challengee went on to climb said route without falling, but I didn’t get to see if the challenger actually followed through with the kiss. It’s probably better that way.
Brian and I said to ourselves and to all of our friends who asked about the trip, that if we had come across this group of guys out climbing and didn’t know who they were, we’d have hightailed it out of the area. Being in the messy, noisy middle of it was part of the fun for me though. And yet, one day was enough. They had their fun— wild and obnoxious— and we had ours— prim and by-the-rules. And, well, we probably had a lot less fun.
I think we might do this again next year. Stay tuned.
I feel the need to say that the boys were as safe or safer than Brian and I had been at their age and without parents who were climbers. They knew what they were doing and took climbing safety seriously. Believe me, I’ve asked.