kyotesue

Meandering Quickly to Puget Sound

Current Location: Whidbey Island NAS Cliffside RV Park 55 degrees F and raining

The MoHo parked alone in the center of Shady Firs RV Park Randle WA

We had a good reason for taking a short trip to Seattle. Thinking that a single day in the busy part of Puget Sound would be plenty to do our business, it seemed that we should make the trip count with an additional few days in the San Juan Islands. I am fully aware that a short week isn’t nearly enough to really experience this magical place, but it is better than nothing. We figured it would give us a chance to dip our paddles and check out the area for possible future trips.

Then the business part of the Seattle day shifted and we actually didn’t really need to go to Seattle at all. By then, however, reservations were made, and a day in Seattle is always fun, right? Hmmmm.

When I say meandering quickly, I know that is an oxymoron. The meander part has to do with the route we chose, avoiding any freeways and enjoying some side roads we haven’t traveled previously. The quickly part has to do with traveling almost 400 miles on our first day.

Mo asked once as the day lengthened why we had planned it this way. I actually had forgotten, but then remembered, oh yes, it had to do with getting to Seattle for the business meeting and then still having time to play.

The meandering route took us north on 97, incredibly familiar, but north of Madras we turned west to follow Highway 197 through Maupin toward The Dalles. In all our years of traveling around Oregon, neither of us could remember taking this route. Even with smoky skies the views of the canyon of the Deschutes River with Mt Hood in the distance were breathtaking. Maupin (pronounced MOPin) seemed to be a cute little place, but we didn’t stop. Remember, we were meandering quickly. So quickly that I didn’t even manage any photos through the windshield.

At The Dalles, intersecting with Interstate 84, we decided to cross the river to the Washington side to Highway 14. As we approached Hood River on the other side of the Columbia, the winds picked up as usual and the famous wind surfers looked like so many wild dragonflies darting across the choppy water. Always fun to watch, I can’t really imagine how they stay upright at. As we watched, several didn’t stay upright in the strong winds.

Crossing at The Dalles turned out to be a great choice, because the bridge north across the river from Hood River is a toll bridge. Nice. We have traveled I-84 many times so it was a completely different view of the Columbia Gorge than we were used to seeing. At the tiny town of Carson we turned north toward Mt St Helens and the rest of the trip to our camp spot in Randle was narrow and winding.

After spending a large part of late summer in drought and smoke from forest fires, it was a treat to drive through rain and moist forests. The views were less than spectacular, however, because this part of the Cascades is thick with trees, lots of them, and most of the views are completely obscured by timber.

Along the southern part of the route especially, we were treated to the mosaic of timber grown and harvested as a crop. It isn’t a forest, not really, it is a timber farm, and I love that these timber farms exist. The private companies manage them much better than they did during the rape and run heydays of the 60’s, and as far as I am concerned it is wonderful to have highly managed productive timber lands that don’t tap into our wild old growth forests. We drove through huge even aged stands of Douglas-fir, and many patches of clear cuts that had regenerated naturally into thick young stands.

As we approached the St Helens Monument on the east side, we found a small roadside rest but only a couple of places where the Mountain was actually visible. We visited the mountain back in 2004 while it was in an eruptive stage. From the viewpoint I compared some of our previous photos and was amazed at how much the forest has regenerated on the blast devastated slopes in the last ten years.

We arrived at the Shady Firs RV Park in Randle just after five. A 400 mile day is an accomplishment on freeways but even more so on the winding side roads. Daughter Deanna passed on a Rand McNally trucker’s GPS to us (she has three types and didn’t need this one) and I spent the day trying to figure it out and by the time we stopped I was worn out and hadn’t driven a mile!

I learned to pay attention to Deanna’s advice: use the GPS, the Atlas, Google Maps, and some common sense. I discovered that the Rand McNally worked great if I knew exactly where I wanted to go and how to get there and programmed it accordingly. I did have to change the settings from “truck” to “car” because it kept trying to route me around things and send me a few hundred miles out of the way. So glad I am not a truck and our full 46 feet of rig and towed length isn’t hard to manage.

Shady Firs was exactly what it claimed to be; a quiet park under shady firs with hookups for fifteen bucks cash Passport America. I didn’t care at all about the rest rooms or the amenities because we only planned to stop for a night. The sites are on grass, the hookups were fine and the dump was free. There were just two sites with sewer, right next to the older trailer that housed a young caretaker. We opted instead for a site out in the middle of the park, without a single camper joining us that night.

It rained all night, a steady patter on the roof that was soft and soothing. The morning dawned with beautiful sunshine streaming through the clouds but within a short time the rain took over once again.

Our second destination was a mere 77 miles away. Mo asked again why it worked out this way and I could only reply that it had to do with finding a Passport America park on our route? Who knows. By noon we were settled into our new site.

Next up: Fort Lewis Military Family Camp and the joys of driving Puget Sound

September

Current Location: Rocky Point Oregon Mostly Sunny and 77 degrees F

I have procrastinated writing a blog all day. The month has been full, with both difficult and delightful moments. I want to talk about the fun, but I do need to get the hard stuff out of the way. Often I think that people who share their feelings about life and the good and the bad things that go on are the best bloggers, the ones I like to read the most. But it can be a fine line. I read Mark’s moody musings with recognition, with “aha’ moments, and Al’s sometimes down days along with the good ones are part of what makes his blog good to read, real. I so appreciate the ups and downs of Sherry and David’s journey, and her willingness to share with us.

There are others who are more reticent, but magnificent photography and wonderful words describing exotic travels are a delight. Now and then my favorite blogger and friend will let some musings slip into her detailed travelogues, and I always enjoy those moments. As I said, a fine line. I have stumbled onto blogs that are terribly tiresome, not because the blogger talked about how they felt about something, but maybe because they went on and on in a way that was …well…whiny and boring. Needless to say, I don’t read those blogs any more.

I do talk about feelings in my blog, maybe more than some, not as much as others. The surprise for me was my need to shut up and shut down when I had to deal with letting my cat Jeremy go. It was and is hard to talk about it somehow. Every animal owner knows the feeling of saying goodbye. It happens to all of us eventually. Even though I found I didn’t want to talk about it, I did discover that I needed to say it had happened, and the flood of condolences and support that came in was a good thing for me. Thank you to everyone who made comments, and especially to MZB, a fellow blogger/friend who recently lost a loved pet as well, and sent long letters to assist me through the process.

I miss Jeremy, of course. Somehow I miss him even more in the MoHo. He loved to travel because he knew we were all right there close together, he didn’t have to go crying around the house trying to find us. In his old age, he hated being alone. He was either on my lap, on Mo’s shoulder, or riding shotgun on the dash whenever we were on a trip. Still, nearly two decades with a cat is a blessing, especially a cat like Jeremy, so I won’t complain any more.

In case you are wondering, Abby is OK. Not exactly fine, but OK. She is still happy and eating and drinking and sticking to Mo like glue as usual. We still have some time with her it seems.

Just a day after Jeremy went to cat heaven, my grandson Xavier was in another play, “The Skin of our Teeth”, at the Linkville Playhouse in Klamath Falls. Daughter Deborah came over from Grants Pass to spend the weekend and go to the play with us. It was a fine evening, and nearly 11pm when I pulled into the driveway back home. I saw some movement on our porch, with dark hulking figures by the door, and started to panic, when a closer look suddenly revealed that the big hulking man on the porch was my grandson Steven!

From left: Deborah, Sue, Deanna, Mo, Steven, Jeremy, Axel, Melody

Daughter Deanna had picked him up in Moses Lake where he now lives and brought him to Rocky Point as a birthday surprise for me. It was a great surprise, in addition to having Deanna here for a few days, I finally got to spend some time with Steven. We have great shared memories of the years when I took him on work camping trips into the wilderness of Idaho when he was a teenager. This was the first time I have seen him since 2007 and since he returned from his second tour in Iraq. Even nicer, Steven was born on my birthday, so it was his birthday too!

What a great weekend we had! I had previously requested a family hike for Sunday the 14th, choosing the Mt Scott trail in Crater Lake as a good place for a family trek. I knew that Melody and my grandkids Xavier and Axel would be there, along with daughter Deb, but had no clue that our little family hike would include Deanna and Steven. Deanna’s husband Keith remained home to do some home time chores in Richland as they are waiting for delivery of a new semi to replace the one they currently own. Deanna has some fairly horrendous stories about California emission laws for truckers, but I won’t go into that right now except to say that it has cost my trucker kids more than 100K in after market fixes and down time.

The fires in the west this year have been terrible, and the skies have been smoky for several weeks now. On the morning of our hike, we still were under smoke from the 790 fire just 9 miles northwest of Rocky Point, and much more smoke from the huge Happy Camp fire just across the border in California. I had so hoped for clear skies for our hike, but decided that we wouldn’t let the smoke get in the way of our family celebration.

If you look closely, you can see the trailhead parking area below

The weather was actually perfect, with cool morning air warmed up by the midday sunshine, not a cloud in the sky, and even with the smoky skies in the distance, once we were above 7,000 feet or so at Crater Lake, the air was clear. Our hike wasn’t so much about the fabulous views of Crater Lake as much as a place to be together as a family and enjoy the outdoors doing something a little bit different.

Mt Scott is the highest point in Crater Lake National Park, and the trail to the lookout at the peak is 2.5 miles each way, with a 1,200 foot elevation rise to the summit at 8900 feet. Unlike some peak trails, however, this one is well graded without a lot of boulder hopping steps. Perfect for all levels of hiking skill. I loved it. Just enough to get a good workout, but not enough to burn anyone out.

Steven put photoshop on my computer so I could get everyone into one frame, but I haven’t tried it yet!After our hike, we continued around the Rim Road that encircles Crater Lake, stopping a few times to enjoy the views. Probably due to the smoke, the park wasn’t especially crowded, but the lake blues were a bit subdued. Even so, as I looked at the lake, I wondered out loud to Mo, “We live here, why don’t we visit this park more often!?” I promised myself more Crater Lake hikes in the future.

With a two hour trip home after the hike, we were all starving, and I was happy that I had slow cooked the ribs all night in the oven. All they needed was a quick glaze on the BBQ. They turned out to be the best ribs I ever cooked. That little trick in George’s recipe for the WeberQ, using sauerkraut between the ribs, makes for fall off the bone tender tasty meat.

Deb and Melody had to go home and back to work, but Deanna and Steven stayed for another two nights, spending a great day talking and sharing stories. Steven was a computer security hacker for the Army, and had some great tricks and ideas for our computers that were really helpful. He also had some rather interesting stories. Whew! The world can be a scary place. Mt Scott family hike (89 of 91)

Deanna took Mo and me (I sounds better, but nope…Deanna took me is the rule, right Sherry?) and Steven to a great birthday dinner at Lake of the Woods Resort, just 15 minutes up the highway, with a beautiful view of the lake from our table. Speaking of the highway, we at last have a name for our pass. I often talk about going over “the unnamed pass” on Highway 140 to Medford. I now have a name. The highway department dubbed our pass “High Lakes Pass” and we now even have a sign at the summit! Good name. The Sky Lakes Wilderness is on the west and the Mountain Lakes Wilderness is on the east side of the road so High Lakes is a great name.

Birthday dinner (15 of 15) Birthday dinner (4 of 15) The final celebration for the week culminated in a trip over the mountain to enjoy a play at the Shakespearean Festival in Ashland. What a treat it was to sit in the gorgeous Allen Elizabethan Theater for a magnificent production of “Into the Woods”. The Festival is world class, and people come from all over the world to see the plays. Mo and I have been to a couple of the plays in two of the other theaters in the past, but seeing a play on this famous stage was first for both of us.

No photography allowed inside the theater, so I took this from the web

Best part of the story, however, was the seat choice. The theater is an open air venue, with rain a rarity in Ashland this time of year. I ordered tickets months ago, and even then the “best” (more expensive) seats were sold out, so we had to settle for row M, toward the back. Lo and behold, it rained! And those “best” ticket holders got all wet while we were completely protected by the balcony above us! Amazing! Even more amazing was the professional way that the cast continued the dancing and singing in those fabulous costumes with barely any acknowledgement that they were getting soaked as well. Pretty incredible!

It would have been a great way to end the month, but instead we are going to end it with an even better plan. We are off to Seattle and the San Juan Islands. Just a short jaunt, because we know that the San Juan’s deserve much more time, but this will be an exploratory trip with a longer visit to come in the future.

As much as I struggled with writing this blog, I knew I had better get it done before we get on the road and I have photos to process and stories to write about another new destination for us! Onward.

Jeremy

August 1996 to September 12 2014

Not much into talking right now, but wanted to mark the day.

08-15-2014 The Long Way Home from Kaslo Part 2

Current Location: Home in Rocky Point

It is getting dark. I have been writing all day it seems, catching up on the last of our trip north to Spokane and British Columbia. I am on a roll, you could say. I have been posting and there are now three posts waiting to go up. This is it. I probably won’t write another thing any time soon.

This week we are off to the cottage, more repairs, more work on our winter place, visit daughter Deborah, hang out, do stuff. Nothing big, just a nice little 2 hour drive over the mountain to Grants Pass. With a few days over the mountain coming up with no computer, I have had a reason to stay focused on catching up the blog. I have at the same time had a chance to catch up on other’s blogs as well, make comments, laughing on facebroke with friends, talking on the phone with other friends, stepping outside for a short bit of lawn mowing or weeding, and then getting back to writing.

The good part of this extended writing exercise is that the feelings of the trip have been coming back to me. I am writing what it felt like, not just the litany of what we did. For me, that is the fun part, remembering the feelings with my body and soul. Sometimes when I write later, that doesn’t happen, but as often as not, if I allow myself to really get ‘into’ it, it does.

I am still in the feeling of the previous night at the Canyon Creek Campground west of Kettle Falls. The last time I was on this road was on what was called “The Densic Tour”, a soil thing where we looked at dense glacial soils in several areas in the northern part of Washington State. It was a great trip with wonderful scientists talking about really cool dirt. The drive brought back good memories of the best parts of my working life.

When Mo and I woke up on Friday morning, the rains had stopped but the skies were still cloudy. Back on the road, we climbed over Sherman Pass, stopped at the summit to read the signs, and learn about this highest drivable mountain pass in the state of Washington. Didn’t really seem that high to me, compared to some of those in Colorado and Montana, but still, the signs were nice. Especially the coyote sculptures and the information about the local tribes.

The town of Republic is in a wild part of Washington, remote, gold country, and still is a small town without many amenities. There is a fossil museum, a couple of nice hotels, good coffee, that sort of thing, but not a lot to make us stop. We had originally planned to travel south directly toward Keller and turn toward the Grand Coulee dam from there, but a few miles south on Highway 21 we saw a sign stating that the road was closed 17 miles ahead.

The road was narrow, there was nowhere to turn around so we kept driving a bit before Mo tried to make the turn and failed. It was a few tense moments as we were slightly jackknifed in the middle of the road before she managed to get us going south again. Finally found a place to turn around, The road was closed due to the large fire burning on the Colville reservation. I knew about the fire, and later when I looked at Inciweb for fire information, realized it straddled both sides of our chosen route for several miles. I hadn’t realized it was still burning.

We returned to Republic, with an extra hundred miles or so add to our day and knew it would be late when we pulled into the reserved campsite at the familiar LePage COE park on the mouth of the John Day River. A 476 mile day is a bit much, but it was so much better than again following the interminably repetitive trip through Spokane and the Tri-Cities.

The road from Republic to Tonasket was a bit winding, but not a problem at all, and once we reached Tonasket and the river we again had to decide whether to stay on the main route south to Wenatchee or continue with our plan to cross the reservation directly southeast toward Grand Coulee.

Nelson and homeward (35 of 70) The Grand Coulee Dam is another place I had visited but Mo had never been there. What can I say about that dam. Sadly, it displaced many people and a few towns. It destroyed the salmon run on the northern part of the Columbia River, the salmon no longer migrate to Kettle Falls. And yet it is one of the greatest accomplishments that man has built.

I love the story of this dam, much as I dislike the story of Glen Canyon. Who knows why I pick and chose my battles, but Grand Coulee Dam isn’t one of them. FDR was president and we were in the midst of a deep depression when the dam was built and thousands of people came from all over the country to build it.

Nelson and homeward (36 of 70) The visitor center is wonderful, with a 45 minute movie about how the dam was built. Fascinating! At the time, it was the largest concrete structure in the world, and it remained so for a long time. It was the first of the dams to attempt to control the Mighty Columbia River and was initially built for the purpose of irrigating the desert of the great Columbia Basin. Only later did power generation become the major output of the dam and now it creates renewable power for hundreds of thousands of people.

Nelson and homeward (46 of 70) The big generators are a wonder of engineering, but even more so are the pumps that lift water several hundred feet from Lake Roosevelt to Banks Lake to be the source of water for hundreds of thousands of acres of rich farmland. The exhibits at the center were fascinating, including the wheelchair that FDR used when he visited the dam. It was worth every mile and every minute that we spent to take time to visit and learn again about this incredible project. I know there is good and bad about the whole dam thing, and yet seeing it was amazing. I loved it and so did Mo.

Nelson and homeward (48 of 70) We left the dam and traveled south toward Ephrata, along Banks Lake and past Steamboat Rock State Park. Turning South from Ephrata we followed the highway toward the Dry Falls of the Grand Coulee, one of the more magnificent geological sites in the entire west. As a new soil scientist in the Inland Northwest, my career was defined most by two huge geologic events, the eruption of Crater Lake/Mt Mazama, and the Great Missoula Floods from 13,000 years ago.

Nelson and homeward (49 of 70) Knowing the ongoing story of the Great Floods, studying the landscapes created by these Ice Age floods, has been one of the most fascinating parts of mapping soils in Washington. It almost made me cry to see the monument to J Harlan Bretz, the geologist who came up with the crazy theory of a catastrophic flood and was ridiculed for years before his theories were finally believed. Evidence of the floods are everywhere in the Inland Northwest, but nowhere greater than Dry Falls. Nelson and homeward (53 of 70)

The visitor center sits high on a ledge, just a few hundred feet from the stone monument viewpoint built in the 1920’s The scenery is breathtaking, the paintings of the size of the falls, bigger than anything that exists on earth today are fascinating. In all my years of working around this part of the world, I had never had the chance to actually stop at Dry Falls and enjoy the exhibits and look over the edge of that great piece of basalt. The great Columbia Plateau is the second largest extensive basalt plateau in the world, only one is India is larger. I love this landscape. Nelson and homeward (60 of 70)

Back in the rig, we continued south toward the fading light as we approached the great and mighty Columbia River in the canyon below. Huge windmills signaled that we were close to LePage once again. Renewable power. Birds and fish are the losers, but who wins when coal isn’t pumped into the atmosphere. It is a conundrum, but I still love the windmills, and I love Grand Coulee dam. Go figure.

Nelson and homeward (70 of 70) When we arrived at our trusty campground, reservation in hand, the kiosk was closed and the sign said Campground Full. Sure enough, a reserved tag held our spot and we set up in the twilight, once again turning on the air conditioner for the warm temperatures. This time, however, I was able to turn it off and switch to the fan before 10 PM and that was encouraging. On the next day we would be traveling Highway 97 home, through Biggs Junction, Moro, Madras, Redmond, Bend, LaPine and Chiloquin before turning west to cross the green Wood River Valley and slide into home in the forest.

Even two weeks sometimes feels like forever when I am away and it is always good to get back.

Next: not a thing that I can predict at the moment.

08-14-2014 The Long Way Home from Kaslo Part 1

Current Location: at home in Rocky Point

There are many options when planning the route home, but there was no option that didn’t include visiting the little town of Nelson on the west arm of Kootenay Lake. I remember Nelson as a small logging community, but even back in the 70’s and 80’s there was some cute stuff there. By the time my friend Maryruth and I saw it, the cultural creative boom was already happening.

Our last day in British Columbia started with rain, and it only got heavier as we traveled south. Big thunderheads loomed above us as we packed up the rig and the first big drops fell just as we drove out of the campground.

There is a dump station associated with the campground in Kaslo. It costs $5 Canadian if you are a registered camper, $8. if not, but it is only open for a couple of hours in the morning and in the evening. We wanted to leave early morning, but the 9am opening of the dump lock gave us the luxury of a leisurely breakfast. We decided to go get in line about 8:45, just in time to be ahead of a big fifth wheel that thought they were going to dump immediately. Sorry, I told them, the manager doesn’t get up till nine. She has a big sign on her door that is a pretty good indication that she doesn’t want to be bothered until exactly 9AM. Who can blame her. Being a campground host must be awful sometimes, everyone always wants something.

Nelson and homeward (5 of 70) Sure enough, just at 9, she showed up looking a bit sleep rumpled and unlocked the cover. We were ready with hoses out and ready to go so it only took us a few minutes to dump. We have that teamwork down pat. We also have the hookup the car thing down pat as well, and I laughed to see a couple of people in the campground taking time out from morning coffee to watch us hook up the Tracker in a few quick clicks. Moments like that I get all cocky and like to show off. Men especially get a kick out of watching us do things efficiently. I have to be careful to not get too cocky because I could just as easily do something stupid or the hitch would stick or the pins would drop in a manhole or something.

Still, we were on the road by 9:10 after a particularly good dump. You know the ones. The tank sensors are all the way green, the flashlight down the toilet reflects on the shiny bottom, and all is good. I can’t figure out why they all aren’t like that.

The road to Nelson followed our route to Balfour and continued along the West Arm of Kootenay Lake, where we saw gorgeous sandy beaches along the beautiful wide river/lake and homes to match. The closer we got to Nelson, the more waterside mansions began to appear. Hmmm, I could live here, I thought. It was breathtakingly beautiful. A bit later, as I perused the Real Estate magazines in Nelson, I saw that those houses were in the vicinity of a couple million bucks. Gentrification is everywhere. What happened to the sleepy logging town in the wilds of BC??

We did love Nelson, and did our usual initial search for the Visitor Center. Right in front of the building, across the street, was curb parking for the MoHo and Tracker. No parking meters, and a driveway behind us so that if someone parked in front of us we could still exit gracefully. A quick stop inside yielded a pretty young thing who knew ALL the best places to eat a great breakfast and told me we could park for a few hours free if we wanted to.

With the cool rain falling, Abby was quite content to remain inside resting. This is a new phenomena. At 12, it seems her separation anxiety has subsided enough that sometimes, not always, she will wait in the MoHo without barking and going into a general state of panic. Lucky for us. Hard rain means that even with dog friendly patios for dining, we might not want to sit outside in the rain with the dog.

Nelson and homeward (1 of 70) Climbing the stairs in the lovely little town built on the side of a cliff, we found the main drag and the string of shops and restaurants that are the mainstay of Nelson. Full Circle Cafe at 11AM still had a long line of folks waiting, but it was the best and we wanted to try it so we put our name on the list and waited. What a great place. More of that signature British Columbia organic stuff with tofu scrambles, and 6 kinds of free range eggs benedict selections. I think they specialized in hollandaise because it came on everything, even the tofu!

Yum. I had an omelet with perfect caramelized onions, goat cheese, and French ham, topped with hollandaise. Insanely good. Mo had what was called the Redneck Burger, free range beef, but that is where the redneck adjective stopped working. I never saw spinach and sprouts on a redneck anything! Her salad was one of the best I have tried. Yum again.

We wanted to get back on the road, with no idea of where we might spend the night, but knew it would be somewhere back in the US. I navigated toward the border, but my BC map in the big Atlas didn’t have enough detail, and with my phone turned off I also didn’t have Google to help out. The GPS is worthless if you don’t have an address, and we didn’t really know exactly where we were headed anyway.

Nelson and homeward (11 of 70) Somehow we ended up going through Salmo instead of Trail and to the beautifully quiet border crossing at Metaline Falls. We didn’t stop at Salmo, but in passing I caught glimpses of some rather amazing stone murals that are the pride of this small town. Hard rain and the upcoming border nixed any ideas of exploring.

Getting back into the US was a bit more complicated than we have ever experienced, and the main culprit was dog food! We knew about the requirements, so Mo was prepared with food in the original bags, but they saw the doggie treat bag and had to check that as well to be sure the treats were made in the USA. They also asked to come in the rig and would we please restrain the dog. Then they asked for the keys to the baby car where the big sack of dog food was stored.

After searching the car and part of the rig, they then wanted an additional photo that matched our passports. While looking at our passports and drivers’ license, they asked what we did before we retired, where we were going, where we had been, and the names of our firstborn children. Oh not that last part actually. They were kind and we had nothing to hide so it was more entertaining than anything, but different than we are used to. After 20 minutes or so we rolled back into the good ole USA.

Metaline Falls is a tiny town on the gorgeous Pend Oreille River, the downriver part of the same river we traveled on our trip north previously. I had never been on this route and it was gorgeous. Even in the rain we stopped to hike up to the lovely falls at the Sweet Creek Falls Wayside on the route of the North Pend Oreille Scenic Byway. For those not familiar with the northwest, the pronunciation is Pond er Ray. Just thought I would mention that. As Spokane is Spo Can, not Spo Kane…and Oregon is Or E Gun not Or E Gone…and Nevada…ooops. guess I got carried away. I have been writing these posts for a couple of days now and am getting a bit rummy.

We turned west toward Kettle Falls through the town of Colville. It was originally the plan to enter the states through Northport and possibly find a place to camp somewhere along the Columbia River. Instead, far south of good camping spots on the river, we continued west on Highway 20 toward Sherman Pass. Stopping in Kettle Falls to top off our fuel, (did I mention we didn’t have to add fuel to the MoHo in Canada?) we wanted to be sure we were ready for boondocking and using the generator. Sometimes it is easy to think, oh we have more than a quarter tank, we can fuel up tomorrow. Not so smart when you want to run the generator. It doesn’t take much fuel, but it doesn’t like a tank below a quarter full and will not run when it drops below that point.

We started up Sherman Pass with a couple of campgrounds in mind, but looking more closely I could see that the more distant one was at 5200 feet and only allowed rigs less than 24 feet long. We could fudge that sometimes, at 26 feet, but why bother when the closer campground had a 30 foot length limit.

Turned out to be a fabulous choice. Except for one other rig on the opposite side of the campground, we were the only ones there. We got a perfectly level site with a campfire ring and no campfire restrictions, and best of all a nice big stash of ready cut firewood for Mo to split. Mo loves a good campfire and with fire restrictions being all over the place it was nice to enjoy a big fire and some marshmallows. The campsite fee was a hefty $3.00 with our senior pass.

There were bear warnings at the campground kiosk, so we kept Abby close, but most of the huckleberries were gone so I didn’t worry too much. Would have been nice to see a bear from the safety of the rig. The signs indicated that in addition to black bear, there were also grizzly in the area. What I didn’t know at the time is that there are also some viable, active wolf packs in that part of the country as well.

After our yellow lighted nights at the Kaslo Campground, the thick darkness and quiet of the Canyon Creek FS campground on Sherman Pass was incredible. The sounds of the rain and a huge thunderstorm only added to the coziness of the MoHo, and actually being cool enough for a blanket was pretty nice, too.

I thought I could fit the entire trip home into one post, but it seems that isn’t to be the case. We did some cool new stuff on the rest of the route that I don’t want to skimp on. Guess I’ll have to go change the title for this one.

Next: The Long Way Home Part 2