The day started out right with breakfast at Perkins. Great service, fine food, and full bellies!
Off to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.
This small section of Idaho we traveled through was rich in forests, mountains and lakes; the perfect place for camping trips and summer getaways. I'm pretty sure my Dad's folks took us around the area when they lived in Spokane and surely we caught a trout or two. Camping with the Cameron's was always fun and fishing was guaranteed.
Montana quickly appeared with, of course, similar landscape for awhile. We missed the great views of the Rockies which were covered by the smoke of recent forest fires. We stopped for gas in Missoula and could distinctly smell the charred trees in the air. AND it was the first time gas broke over $3.00 on our trip, though not the last.
We ate lunch at the luxurious (a-hem) Costco in Bozeman where we had to come to a hard decision. Instead of driving through Yellowstone to see Old Faithful, etc. we chose to continue on with the goal of reaching Casper, WY. By the time we had lunch it was nearly 4pm and we were having a heck of a time finding lodging near the south/southeast of the park. Instead of rush through a trip that easily warrants a weekend, if not a week, we decided to play it safe and keep driving to a spot where we knew we'd find lodging.
We drove through Billings, MT where my mother was born. Unfortunately there was nothing to take a picture of. Sorry, Mom.
Near the edge of Montana we got a glimpse of Yellowstone and snapped a few pictures of what we will surely visit extensively someday.
We crossed into Wyoming and drove through Little Big Horn and the Indian reservation. A personal desire of mine was to spend time on a reservation if we had the chance. Driving through was enough of an experience, though it would be amazing to see a Pow-Wow.
The landscape was sparse, the wind blew fiercely and tumble weed tossed about the road.
Darkness descended, as it usually does, and we stopped for gas and a bite to eat in Sheridan, WY. McDonald's was sufficient. We went inside to order and received yet another cultural experience. There was a whole mess of employees working that night. At the front three young ladies tended to the cash registers -well, I believe they were supposed to, but only one was ringing people up. They all spoke Russian to each other. It was the weirdest thing. Behind me stood a line of American Indians and in front of me, aimlessly standing around and working as slow as snails, stood at least 5 Russian or Slavic McDonald's employees....in Wyoming.
Lightning made regular appearances in the distance surrounding us and the stars above slowly appeared out of the black sky. The roads were double laned and the night traffic, mainly consisting of other long distance drivers like us and truckers, moved along without delay. There is something absolutely fabulous about singing along to CCR in the dead of night, lighting flashing around you, and driving along a barren highway. It was a definite road trip experience.
Thankfully we learned our lesson, made reservations ahead of time and were able to check into our Motel 6 with no problem...well, except that five police cars where already there dealing with a "situation." It was nearly 11:30pm when we got settled into our room and were too tired to care what the big deal was about. Thankfully we were on the opposite sideof the building and had a very peaceful night.
A note about Montana and Wyoming. This inland route came highly recommended and I'd been told it was some of the most beautiful country ever. Now maybe we drove through the crappy section and others who said the route was a MUST drove elsewhere, but we couldn't tell the difference between one raggedy hill and another. It was a terribly boring drive broken up by, well, it wasn't broken up by anything -just field upon field upon field of dry, yellow grass. If we ever do have to drive through these states we'll definitely take a more western route. The only cool part was the sagebrush getting caught in the front bumper. That and the lightning, but you can see that nearly anywhere in the midwest and south.
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