Day 5 (Full version)

Day 5 – Saturday – June 29, 2013

0700 Wake up.  It is wet outside again.  Thunderstorm rolled through about 5 a.m.

0853 Almost on the road.  Ron’s wallet was left inside the tent so we had to dig it out before we could go.

0857 Stop to take pictures of the lake and the creek.

0906 Sign says: Delay of 5 vehicles or more is illegal.  Must use turnout.

0907 Diablo Lake Overlook.  Great views here!  It is 62 degrees and the sun is hot already.

0948 Granite Creek

0956 Porcupine Creek

1000 Rainy Lake Trail in the Okanogan National Forest.  Rocco seems to like walking on the snow.  Even when he could go around, he doesn’t.  The lake is beautiful with many waterfalls on the far side.  Definitely worth the stop and the short hike.  At one point, Rocco was pulling Felisa, a la Marmaduke.  Luckily she didn’t fall.  Unfortunately the bathrooms here were disgusting.  There were also no fee envelopes out so people couldn’t pay the use fee.  Seemed like a neglected trail head.  Budget cuts or bad management?  Not sure.

1135 Back on the road.  We are about 2 ½ hours from Grand Coulee Dam.

1154 Klipchuk campground

1156 Leaving North Cascades Scenic Highway and the Okanogan National Forest.

1157 Hitchhiker on the side of the road.  Sorry but we are full to the brim.  There’s not even room to ride on the roof!

12:04 p.m. Very pretty valley with lots of horses

12:15 p.m. Winthrop, WA – a nice, cool old town.  The main street is a shopping district and there is even a cool pedestrian bridge on the edge of town.  We pick up lunch to go from Carlos 1800 Express (no dogs allowed at any of the restaurants in town).  Yummy Mexican food even if we did have to eat in the car.

12:44 p.m. Shafer Museum in Winthrop.  Also looks interesting for a future visit.

12:47 p.m. Methow River

1:13 p.m. Loup Loup Summit, 4020 feet.  There are lots of motorcycles on this road – must be the scenic route.

1:28 p.m. Big net covering the entire orchard.

1:29 p.m. Curtis Sheep Slaughter historic marker.  Hmm. Wonder what that was about. (Looked it up – apparently some angry cattlemen killed a bunch of sheep one night in 1903 to protest the increase in sheep farmers)

1:36 p.m. Canadian border is just 50 miles away…

1:40 p.m. Omak, WA

1:43 p.m. Coulee Corridor National Scenic Byway

1:54 p.m. Two cop cars chatting.  Must be the afternoon break time.

1:59 p.m. Rocco is thirsty.

2:02 p.m. News on the radio is talking about the current heat wave.  The forecast high for Death Valley today is 128 degrees, close to the hundred-year record of 134 degrees – the highest recorded temperature on Earth.  Death Valley is on our California bucket list but I’m thinking we probably shouldn’t visit in the summer.  The entire west coast is in the heat wave.  There have been lots of Facebook posts from friends back on the Central Coast lamenting the hot weather.  It definitely has not been as cool and refreshing on this trip as I was expecting considering how far north we are.  So I guess the good news is it would be worse if we were south.

2:04 p.m. News report – searching for a lost hiker on Mt. Hood

2:05 p.m. Disautel Pass, 3252 feet

2:06 p.m. Deer roadkill.  It looked like it had been smooshed and stretched – eew!

2:14 p.m. A hawk just swooped down to the road.  Looked like it was trying to grab us!

2:21 p.m. Colville Indian Agency

2:29 p.m. Spirit Ridge RV Park has teepee rentals!

2:30 p.m. Grand Coulee Dam in the distance

2:41 p.m. Arrive at the dam.  Whoa!  That’s a lot of water!  I haven’t seen that much water flowing over the spillways since Hoover Dam in the 80s.  What did we learn?

Felisa – Grand Coulee Dam is one of the largest concrete structures in the world.

Ryan – This dam has 11,975,521 cubic yards of concrete compared to Hoover Dam which has about 3,500,000 cubic yards.

3:19 p.m. Gas, $4.03/gallon

3:40 p.m. Wilbur, WA – had a giant Wilbur statue and a covered wagon.  Too bad we missed getting a picture of Wilbur.

4:28 p.m. Our 3G cell service has returned.  Commence the Facebook updates!

5:07 p.m. Idaho

5:15 p.m. Coeur d’Alene

5:41 p.m. Passed the Silverwood Amusement Park.  Lots of rollercoasters.

5:59 p.m. Lake Cocolalla

6:10 p.m. Sandpoint, ID

6:14 p.m. Safeway for provisions

6:30 p.m. Leaving Safeway and heading up the mountain to Schweitzer Ski Resort

7:00 p.m. Waiting at the lodge while Ron checks us in to our condo

7:15 p.m. At the condo.  Which has an insanely steep driveway.  No way would I tackle that in the winter. Yikes!  Everyone is very excited to have a house instead of a tent, even Rocco.  We unload the car then make dinner – rotisserie chicken, rice-a-roni, Caesar salad, and French bread.  Rocco tried to steal a chicken bone from the trash. Bad dog!  After dinner, showers for all.

10:00 p.m. Bedtime.  In beds!  J