July 13 we said goodbye to Yellowstone National Park and took off north on US89 then merged onto I90 for the next couple of days.
The first day we drove 360 miles north and west across Montana around large cities, past beautiful scenery, through a couple of mountain passes, and along rivers.
The Missoula metro area took up this whole valley.
We stopped for the night at this little casino/large gift shop about an hour from the Idaho border.
Behind the building is a large gravel parking lot cum free rv park. There were several no hookup spaces and 2-3 electric posts. We happened to find one with 50 amp service so that we could be cool in the 90 degree afternoon heat.
After a restful night we drove on, entering Idaho and the Pacific time zone at the same time. (Oddly, only the narrow neck of the state uses Pacific time. The lower part of the state uses Mountain Time!) We crossed the narrow neck through a series of low (1000ft) mountain passes,
entered Washington.
Once past Spokane,
we spent the greater part of the day driving along the top of a long mesa
past a few large farms with small settlements between.
The plateau was covered with large irrigated fields of corn, wheat, and hay.
Crossing the mighty Columbia River, we drove in into western Washington.
wildlife overpass
We had intended to stop for the night at another free casino at the junction of CR 18 but missed the connection and couldn't find a place to turn around.
The next thing we knew we were headed down the ramp to join the "rush hour" traffic around I5 going south around Tacoma.
By the time we left the traffic behind we realized that we were only a couple of hours from our rv park. When we arrived we were able to get into our site a day early.
We settled into our new home--Evergreen Coho Escapees (co-op) RV Park--for the next month.
The next day--Thursday--our friends Brock and Leola arrived. Now our group is settled in and ready to explore our new area together.
Tomorrow, a short ride.
Louise and Duane
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