Home Again

And so, we're home at last.  After 2 700-mile days, right through the rains of Gustav, we were very relieved to arrive here.

But what a wonderful trip it was!  We learned so much about the northwestern part of this amazing country.  We enjoyed so much beauty.  We learned and experienced so much geology, paleontology, and the flora and fauna.  I think of the geothermal power in Yellowstone; the sad remains of the glaciers in Glacier National. Park; the huge floods that caused Dry Falls; my eye-to-eye contact with the buffalo and seeing the wonderful Stag; the grandeur of Mt. Ranier; the salmon going up the weirs in Seattle.  Even the baseball game with Charlie and Robin (thanks, you guys, for getting me out of that little childish box!).

Wow!  It was great!  We have learned to avoid flying anywhere (except across the ocean).  It's too much trouble and you miss the countryside!  We have learned that we are too old for 700-mile days!  We have a new appreciation for the American West. 

We are so thankful that we were able to make this trip.  Now we're home and I'm facing hundreds of pictures that have to be weeded through!  No pleasure without pain.  ;-)

I hope you've enjoyed sharing this wonderful trip with us.

September 2: Wyoming Again

We started the morning in Pocatello, Idaho, and moved into Wyoming almost without notice. Rolling hills, no hills, lots of sage brush, irrigated fields. It is easy to know where the water is—it's green. Everything else in barren. But then we had an adventure!

Eons ago, in the Eocene Period, a large area of Wyoming was a large, shallow lake, with conditions much like South Florida, but minus the retirees and Cubans, of course. Crocodiles, sting rays, snakes, turtles, bats, tropical plants, frogs, small mammals, and fish abounded. As they died, they fell to the bottom of the lake, and sediment quickly covered them.

Live was wetter then, and the climate more temperate. Years passed, and the animal and plant remains were pressed deeper and deeper into the silt. But change is always inevitable, so a few million years later, Fossil Butte is all that is left of their happy little world. And Wyoming is high and dry—subject, of course, to the effects of global warming.  So, visit while you can.

Seriously, there is an excellent Visitor Center with many good pictorial and other exhibits, including a good film. This site is well worth visiting.

As we continued through the wastelands of Wyoming, we saw a huge limestone quarry, accompanied by the requisite cement processing plant.  This area probably provides cement for the entire northwest, since so much of the rock there is basalt and granite and the like.  We also passed some oil/gas pumping places.  

In some ways, rural Wyoming is like Appalachia, without all the trees and bushes to cover all the worn out cars and tractors and machinery of all kinds.  The towns we passed through had anywhere from 200 to the big metropolis of Laramie, some 20,000.  We're sleeping here tonight. The homogenization of America is complete, depending on the size of towns. Some rate a Home Depot and these usually have Ace Hardware, beauty shops, taverns, gas stations, and flower shops. The population of smaller towns could almost be determined by seeing what amenities they have.  Towns under 400, for example, never have flower shops and may have only one tavern! We're enjoying this slice of Americana.  I'll never feel the same way about the far west. I think I've gained at least a little appreciation of who populates these landscapes, from lovely farm and ranch land to desert wastes.  I'm not planning to move here; I'm not that intrepid!

We ended the day with finishing our quatrain began in Yellowstone:

Oh give me a home where the buffalo roam.

Today we saw places:

Where the deer and the antelope play.

Saw lots of antelope enjoying the ranch grasslands.

It's a great trip, but we are getting tired. The next two days will be homeward bound—I think about 700 miles a day.

Goodbye Washington - Hello Ore-Ida

August 31-September 1

As we head toward Oregon, we head into a different Washington.  The Northern Cascades seem to divide the state into the Pacific Northwest and the Northwest.  Here in the Northwest, we are again seeing some mountains, but more giant rolling hills beneath the ever-growing sky.  There are some ranches and, increasingly, more farms and orchards.  The hills are tawny and dry, and the valleys are rich and green.  Because of the prehistoric floods, this area is known for its excellent soil, but it seems to be very dependent upon irrigation from the rivers.  I doubt that much agriculture, except perhaps ranching could survive without it.  As we cross the Snake River, joining the Columbia, we see more grain facilities.  Some have great pyramids of wheat.  Fertile country indeed—as long as you have water.

But the Pacific Northwest has been our favorite part of this great state. How we enjoyed lounging beside large windows in "Vaughan Lodge" (built on a hill and surrounded by forest) loving the tall trees, the wide variety of birds, and watching for the Douglas Squirrel, who has the coloration of a robin.  Charlie and Robin are great hosts.  Then there is the beauty all around Seattle:  the sea, Puget Sound, ridge after ridge of mountains, some covered with evergreen forest, others above timberline, all presided over by the magnificent Mount rainier.  Even the city skyline is beautiful. We have tremendously enjoyed being here.

The deeper we go (at least on this route!) into Oregon, and then Idaho, the more desert appears.  We see rolling hills of nothing but sage brush, framed by rather high, barren cliffs.  

There is little traffic, and the towns range from small to über small.  I notice that all seem to have storage facilities, beauty shops, flower shops, and hardware stores.  If one of those is missing, it is really small—like under 1000 people.  Ace Hardware is faithfully present, even when the town is lucky enough to be small enough not to have a Walmart!

We slept in Pendleton, Oregon the first night, and our first stop that morning was the Pendleton Mill.  It was Labor day, so there were no tours, but the store was open.  Lovely shopping for both of us!  I now have a winter suit that doesn't shout, "Talbots!" and Don found some things he wanted as well.  A very satisfying stop for both of us.

In the late afternoon we came to a place called Craters of the Moon. It's a National Monument.  It is essentially the remains of volcanic action.  Cinder cones can be seen here and there, but most impressive is that most of it is covered in a black lava flow, and there are great amounts of volcanic ash (pumice). The moon isn't black, and this place is, but is other-worldly.  Huge chunks of ash lie everywhere.  It is like being in a giant bed of ashes after the fire has gone out.  It is a veritable wasteland of black matter, but we see life in the forms of plants like Sage Brush, Limber Pines, and a surprisingly large number of wildflowers.

As we approach the east, I am happy to report that we have won the long-distance license plate award.  We have seen one car from Boston and one from Florida, and that was in Yellowstone. So we claim the prize!

One oddity: As we drove through rural Oregon, nothing but a few farms around, we realized we were on a marked evacuation route.  Evacuate from what?  Volcanos? Blizzards? Earthquakes? Tornados?  

In deepest Idaho (truly the empty quarter) we learned that in this area was developed the technology for the development of nuclear submarines.  They had the first electric power from nuclear energy—in 1949!  Perhaps the Oregonians were prepared to escape nuclear waste?

And in rural Idaho, we passed a large area of brush fire on the prairie.  Many trucks and firemen were out in force putting it out.  We saw no flames, but the ground was smoking and the air smelled of fire.

It's late tonight (we're in Pocatello), but maybe I'll add a picture later.