Sunday, October 13
We left the house at 5:50, cloudy and 62 degrees. The first day is always the “get out of civilization as quickly as we can” day. And us doing that is always dependent on traffic, especially in Chattanooga, Nashville, St. Louis and Kansas City. We stopped at the Rend Lake rest area and had lunch.
We got to the Drury Inn in St. Joe at 7:15. Dinner was at Bandana’s BBQ. Yummy!
Total miles driven – 842
While I was anxiously awaiting our Harvest Road Trip, I spent more time in the sunroom watching the birds and taking photos of flowers.
I began sitting in the sunroom and watching the bluebirds. This little guy was too funny taking a bath!
Caught a cardinal at the birdbath and a chipmunk chomping down on acorns.
I was also shooting flowers and playing with some editing.
Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, August 27, 28 and 29
Tuesday was spent getting ready to head home and sitting on the kids’ wonderful front porch.
We left Laramie Wednesday morning at 8:30 and got to the Drury Inn in St. Joe at 8:30. Another opportunity for a yummy BBQ pork/chicken salad from Bandana’s BBQ.
We left St. Joe at 8:45 Thursday morning and headed east. It was a long, boring ride home.
Total miles driven – 7426
States visited – 15
Monday, August 26
The kids went back to work and school so we went on a drive.
Saturday and Sunday, August 24 and 25
We left Rock Springs at 10:00. It was 50 degrees–in the middle of August! We were on our way to Laramie and Miss B. :)
We got to Laramie at 1:05 and checked into the AmericInn.
On Sunday we took lunch up to the Snowies. Even though it was really windy, as it normally is, I thoroughly enjoyed sitting at Lake Marie for a while.
Miss B went fishing but didn’t catch anything.
While they were all fishing or walking around, I was watching this guy stopping to smell eat the flowers.
This guy came up and talked and talked and talked. He was from Texas and was so excited to be fishing. He was on a road trip, camping and fishing along his way up to Yellowstone where he would connect with his wife. I told him I’d take some pictures of him so he had proof that he really had been fishing.
When we got home, Miss B’s friend Quill came over to play. My goodness, those two girls made a racket!
Friday, August 23
We were going to drive through Yellowstone and Teton on our way to Laramie.
Yellowstone:
Teton:
Once we got through Yellowstone and Teton, it was a pretty boring drive into Rock Springs. We arrived at the hotel at 6:30. Dinner was at the restaurant at the hotel–Old Chicago. My Spaghetti Pie was good!
Total miles driven – 5309
Thursday, August 22
After some deliberation on where to go next, we decided to go to West Yellowstone.
We drove through the Craters of the Moon National Monument & Preserve in Idaho. It was really interesting but kind of eerie. It consists of 750,000 acres of lava.
We got to West Yellowstone at 8:00 and checked into the 3 Bear Lodge. Dinner was Caesar salads from the hotel restaurant.
Total miles driven – 5004
Wednesday, August 21
When we got to the hotel the night before, we looked at the map to decide where we would go next. We realized how close we were to the Palouse area, a place I’d wanted to go but never thought I’d get to. So off we went!
After we drove around the Palouse some, we stopped when we saw someone harvesting. Tommy got to ride in the combine which was harvesting barley.
When he was done, Janet (one of the owners of this farm) gave us directions to two places where we could get a view of the rolling hills.
I would love to see this area in the spring and early summer. Must be beautiful!
We drove on to Bay City, OR, to spend the night at the Quality Inn. Dinner was at the restaurant there and was pretty good.
Total miles driven – 4524
Tuesday, August 20
We left the hotel and drove south on Highway 93. The whole area around Flathead Lake is absolutely beautiful!
We drove on to Ravalli, MT, to find the place where we’d gotten Lambert cherries the year before. Happily we found the place and there were cherries to buy. When we left there we decided to head to Idaho. As we drove Highway 12 from Missoula towards Idaho we saw these two signs. Both of them were true!
While it was a nice drive, there weren’t many photo ops. We finally got to the Holiday Inn in Lewiston, ID, at 8:45. We had pizza delivered from Southway Pizza. It was probably the best pizza dough I’d ever eaten.
Total miles driven – 4180