Laundry and Football

2019-09-28 (Saturday)

Today was our combo laundry and football day. We woke up at our nice green state park campsite, and drove down into town, i.e. Castle Rock, WA. It is really a sweet little town-- a lovely riverwalk path, all the necessary small stores and civic buildings, etc. But what we were interested in, as I wrote in yesterday's blog, was a laundromat and good wifi reception, and that's what we got.

We set ourselves up in front of the laundromat at about 11:15 or so, and I loaded 3 loads of laundry into the machines. The washes were finished before 12:30 kickoff, but we had to juggle the dryers a little bit. For one thing, I had trouble using one of the machines and thought it wouldn't start. I also didn't get change out of the change machine after it ate my dollar bill, and Joey had to go next door to get more quarters. Then he was a good sport and stayed with the dryers after the game started. But it was all finished before halftime, and he did some of the folding, and I did the rest while I watched the game.

The game was MSU vs. Indiana, and I seem to be the only one who remembers that Indiana always gives the Spartans fits. This game was no different, and it was remarkably close right up until the very end. I was braced for the worst, but the Spartans pulled it out with the last drive, going ahead in a tied game with a field goal, leaving only 5 seconds left on the scoreboard. Indiana tried a razzle-dazzle, pass the football around like a hot potato trick play, trying to score in those 5 seconds. But on the second pass, the MSU defense knocked it loose, and it bounced into the end zone, where one of the Spartan defenders fell on it. So the final score was a 9-point win, but it wasn't anything like that. It was a great game if you were impartial (like the announcers--they were really enjoying it!) but a nail biter if you were me. But we won--YAY.

After the game, I started trying to figure out where we should drive tonight (about time, right?) Joey went and did the grocery shopping while I calculated our next moves. He even hooked up the Jeep alone. But I finally decided where we should head for (Mt. Hood), and then we left. There was a little sprinkle as we left town, and we saw another nice rainbow.

Before we got to Portland, we saw the Columbia River on our right, which was like seeing an old friend again (we drove next to the Columbia back when we visited Grand Coulee Dam.) We also caught glimpses of Mt. Hood in the far distance--a gleaming white upside-down cone. We were feeling a bit dumb that we hadn't seen Mt. Ranier-- we were pretty close to it for much of our time in Washington. But just after we crossed into Oregon and had maybe 10 miles along the Columbia River, I looked to my left (north, back into Washington) and said, "Holy Crap!  THERE'S Mt. Ranier." I mean, OMG, you can not MISS it, it is so dominating on the horizon!! It is simply humungous. Sadly, I couldn't get any photos of it.

Unfortunately, as we drove down the highway, there was a heavier rainstorm, and clouds, and I started to worry about driving in the dark. So as we passed Portland, we pulled over into a parking lot and used several different apps, until we found a county park about 15 minutes or so south of Portland. We got here just as it became truly dark, but the camp host came out to meet us, and now we are tucked in for the night. There's even a shower--an unexpected luxury. So we're feeling okay. Tomorrow we'll head for Klamath Falls, to see our godson Adam. And then into Northern California to Lassen Volcanic National Park (yes, more volcanoes). And we'll try to avoid the winter storm that is threatening the entire northwest. I didn't pack any winter jackets!

Short and Cranky

2019-09-26 (Thursday)

Today was a strange day from beginning until the end. And it won't make for a long blog, either. We first got ready to leave our gorgeous campsite on time--only to get hung up at the dump site. It seemed a guy two RVs ahead of us was filling some kind of enormous water tank that would last him 8 days in the desert. He and the people between us got into a shmooze fest and in the end it was almost 30 minutes until they moved on and we could dump and fill our own tanks. It was about 11:30 when we left.

We drove down US 101, stopping only once, in a small "town" with a one-stop spot which included a post office, where I bought a few more stamps and dropped off some postcards. I also chatted with the postmistress (isn't that an old-fashioned word?) who seemed kind of "eh" on the subject of Mt. Ranier, but loved Mount St Helens. This became more info for me to cogitate... I had thought we'd head next to Mt. Ranier, but for several reasons, I was having second thoughts. I was thinking of skipping Mt. Ranier NP and go straight to Mount St. Helens instead.

Meanwhile, we arrived in Aberdeen, the largest town we'd been in for several weeks. I saw a Safeway was coming up on our route, and I wanted time to think. We also needed a grocery stop. So we stopped there, and I went inside to shop. I was delayed a couple of times in the store (couldn't reach the Half & Half, and then trying to get a store rewards card, because it would save me 10% of my somewhat hefty bill.) The end was that it was after 2:00 when I got finished.

Considering the time etc., and other factors, I decided we should go to Mount St. Helens today, find a campground, and tomorrow we'd explore the mountain. Then we'd have to figure out where to go for some decent wifi or TV reception for the MSU game at 12:30 local time on Saturday.

And that's how we ended up at yet another KOA. I am feeling kind of disappointed about it-- after such gorgeous national park campgrounds for the past 3 nights, this is crowded, unappealing, and there seems to be a crowd trying to use the laundry room, which was one reason I wanted to be here. I think we will leave tomorrow, laundry or not, and look for a nicer spot. There is a state park campground only a few miles from here, and I would have gone there first if I'd known the laundry was not going to happen. The good news is, Joe had a great shower, and I'm going to take one next.

I hope tomorrow seems more fun. I'm disappointed by today. It was just one of those days when nothing went smoothly.

A Quiet Day, except for Football

Masonic Hall, Columbia Falls, MT

2019-09-14 Saturday

Today we had a very quiet day, if you define quiet as, no sightseeing. It was NOT quiet during the MSU football game, when I (along with all the other Spartan fans in the world) was screaming murder at the coaches and officials. No joy in Mudville after the worst loss I think I’ve ever seen them take. Time to move on.

I slept in this morning, and Joe made us a yummy brunch of fresh baked biscuits and bacon and eggs. After that, I took Cassie for a walk, and then did laundry (just the linens) and read my book. After that, 2pm local time, was the football game. Time to move on.

At about 7:00, Joe suggested it was time for dinner. He’d been searching on google, and had discovered a 5-star pizza place. Sure, why not? So we got into the Jeep and drove about 6 or 8 blocks from the RV park to what turned out to be a FABULOUS pizza place. Best pizza we’ve had in ages. Better than the pizza places in HP. We told the waitress when she asked, saying we were from New Jersey. Oh, she says—the owner is from New Jersey too! Well, no WONDER the guy knows from pizza! We complimented him on the way out. He is from Verona, NJ. The pizza, as I said, was fabulous.

After that, we decided some ice cream was in order. Again, google was sending us to the best 5-star ice cream, this time in Whitefish, MT, about a 15-20 minute drive from where we are. It seemed silly (no ice cream in Columbia Falls?) but what the heck, it was an adventure. So we drove there. I had the chocolate, and Joey had “huckleberry” flavored ice cream (no, it was not no-sugar-added .) I thought it was good, but frankly, not as good as Thomas Sweet or Woodside Farms Creamery in Newark near Beth. But it was a fun adventure. Whitefish is clearly a tourist-based town. We walked a little bit after the ice cream and looked into the windows of some of the shops— many very upscale stores. Columbia Falls, in contrast, seemed to have more funky places. 

And then we drove home. That was our day! I heard some ladies talking while I was folding laundry, saying the park was 40% busier this year than last year. And that the roads and parking lots were really crowded. So we are not going to try to go up the Going-to-the-Sun Road tomorrow from this west side of the park (the road closes part the way as of Monday, so even the locals may be trying to get a last look at the scenery before that.) Instead we will head west.

I took one photo today, of the Masonic Hall here in Columbia Falls, up across from the pizza place. The building was very interesting on the outside— it was like a cinder block building with NO windows. The entire exterior was painted with tromp d’oeil (or however it’s spelled) paintings. But my phone was supposed to email the photo to me, and it is stuck in “pending”. And I am tired. So it’s bedtime, and no photos for today.

A Day on the Blackfeet Reservation

2019-09-12 Thursday

We woke up early this morning, and by 10:00 or so, we had packed up, hooked up the Jeep, dumped the waste tank, filled the water tank, and were on the road south to Browning, MT. I wrote on Tuesday when we drove through town that Browning is the seat of the Blackfeet Indian Authority, and although no one would consider it large by New Jersey standards, it is sizeable enough to have a NAPA store for auto parts, and at least one car mechanic.

The drive down here (the alternative to US 89 we should have taken on Tuesday, and would have taken had we known about it) was really beautiful. The mountains around here are gorgeous, especially with the foreground of golden fields of wheat and grazing land. The combination is simply wonderful and I never get enough of it.

When we arrived in Browning, we decided that we’d go to the NAPA store first, on the theory that they would know who in town we should ask about looking at the Jeep brakes. They sent us back up the same road we’d just come down, and we were fortunate to find the garage--it was off the main road, on an unpaved road, in what looked basically like a beaten-up garage, and the signs all said “towing.” (Quite honestly, all too many of the buildings in this town look about the same, and at least half of the streets are unpaved.) Anyway, we were greeted by a young guy named Donny, who is the mechanic. We unhooked the Jeep so he could look at the brakes, after he told us that the parts would probably not be availabe in town and would have to be ordered from the NAPA.

A few minutes later, the owner Allan came out to chat with us. He said that Donny was the mechanic--that he (Allan) just drove the tow truck! We discussed what our problem was, and Donny was available to fix it, but again, probably not be finished until tomorrow. This was, frankly, what we’d sort of expected would happen. Allan eyed the RV and asked us if we had a place to stay for the night. We said “we’ll find someplace,” and I could see him thinking. Then he said that if we wanted, we could stay next to the garage, and they could “hook us up” for the night. We thought this was exceptionally nice, although there were two signs saying “beware of dog.” Also, quite honestly, the place looked like a pile of automobile discards and it would basically be like staying in a junk yard. I really was grateful for the offer (which Allan repeated later), but I just felt uncomfortable about the whole thing.

Meanwhile, the decision was that the Jeep needed a total brake job, basically--the rotors (whatever they are) were damaged, etc. I don’t know... I wasn’t up for a lesson on brakes. But what happened was, we drove in the RV back to the NAPA store, where we bought what we needed which they had in stock, they ordered the rest (“it will be here by 9:00 a.m. tomorrow”, they promised) and then we drove back to the mechanic with the boxes of stuff they already had. I could see the Jeep was already on a lift, with the tires off. Allan came outside again and said he would “get Donny working on the job,” and reiterated the offer to stay if we wanted. We told him we had laundry and whatever, so we would be keeping busy for the day. He nodded and we said goodbye.

By then it was about 1:30 pm-- amazing how time goes by while dealing with this kind of thing! We decided to go to the laundromat (Allan recommended the place I’d found on google) and eat, then do laundry. So that is what we did. Although unprepossessing from the outside (i.e. it looked like a shed, again), it was a new laundromat with new machines and a nice lady in charge. I dragged our stuff in, and got to work. Meanwhile, Joey had projects too. He had already replaced a back-up tail light on the RV after the first NAPA stop. While I did laundry, he climbed on the roof of the RV and installed a new vent cap, which we’d picked up a number of days ago (we’ve been missing one for a while, and we needed it to prevent back-flow odors from the waste tank when we drove.) That took about the same amount of time as my laundry.

We’ve also been having electrical issues with our “house” battery, which has not been holding a charge. Joe figured that since it was only 4pm, he wanted to see if the NAPA store had a battery of the right size--if it did, he wanted to put in a new battery. He’s tired of not having the charge we should have (the old battery was a year old.) So we drove back to the NAPA store for I think the 3rd or 4th time. I waited outside while he went in, looked at batteries; came out and did some more research; went back in, came out again and removed our old battery, and then came back with a new one (at least this time, the young guy in the store carried it for him.) He put in the new battery, and came inside, really exhausted from all the exertion.

I could see he was pretty much done for the day, so we drove from there to the grocery (the distance between the laundry, grocery, and NAPA was about a half mile on the same main drag through town--we just kept driving up and down!) We went over our list, then I went inside and did the shopping while he rested. When I came out, it was 6:00 and we had to decide about where to spend the night. Neither of us felt that comfortable taking Allan up on his offer, but there seem to be no campgrounds in this town. One is closed already for the season, and one other (allegedly 2.5 miles away) did not exist when we went to see it.

I had the idea of checking out the large casino I had noticed two days ago when we drove into town. It is right next to the Museum of the American Plains Indian. So we drove there. The place was really hopping! I figured we could ask if we could stay, and at least eat something while we were there, because I could see Joey did NOT want to be cooking. So we ate dinner in their “restaurant” (a glorified snack bar with slot machines.) Then we asked at the desk if we could park in their lot in the RV overnight. The security guard came to talk to us, and said that we might be better off next door at the museum. I asked him specifically if it was posted with “no overnight parking,” and he said it was not. So that is where we are. It’s dark here, and pretty quiet, and we should be fine.

We are about a half-mile from the NAPA, and Joey seems determined to get there at 9am to pick up the last brake parts, so Donny can finish up his work and we can be on our way. Although today went about as expected, and fairly smoothly, I am not so sure it will be that fast tomorrow. However, our route from East Glacier to West Glacier/Kallispell planned for tomorrow would have run through Browning in any case, so we are at least not out of the way. It just may take a bit longer to get out of town. We’ll see what happens when the time comes.

Meanwhile, although we were “stuck” getting the brakes dealt with, we used our time very productively, getting the laundry and other repairs done, and grocery shopping. We have limited wifi, so I can upload these blogs, although it doesn't seem to be supporting my photo uploads, which will have to come later. I was able to pick up some phone messages, and So I can’t say that today was a waste in any way, and it was kind of interesting spending a day on the Blackfeet reservation. I am sad that it does not look more prosperous, but we did our best to pump dollars into the economy!

Hanging Around in Hill City

Today was a lovely, leisurely day of just enjoying ourselves in a low-key kind of way. It seems that although there are oodles of things to see in the Black Hills, we may have seen the things most compelling to us (the Mammoth Site, the drive we took yesterday, Crazy Horse Monument, Deadwood, etc.) and so many of the other things are those kind of “family fun” places which are not geared for us at this point. 

So we went for the practical— we started the day with a visit to the laundromat. The place was small, but not crowded— I was able to get 3 machines right away, and by the time they were done, there was no one else using the dryers either. So I sat down with my iPad and uploaded yesterday’s blog, and tried to get my phones charged at the same time. Working on the blog made the time pass very quickly, and the dryers turned out to be very efficient also (i sure hope my clothes didn’t shrink—i put them on Low but they dried in 30 minutes, a little worrying.) In any case, I was finished at 1:00 pm. Joe and Cassie, meanwhile, were hanging out on the bench outside in the shade, people watching and talking to people who started up conversations. 

Whirligigs and lawn chotchkas

We put all the clean laundry into the Jeep, and then went to find a place on Main Street in Hill City to eat lunch. I was concerned about Cassie, though— the weather had gotten warmer than we expected. So we popped the roof off of the Jeep on the passenger side. It was heavier than I expected, so rather than take it off and try to wedge it into the front seat, we just left it up on the roof! That worked perfectly fine, and we ate right across the street from where we’d parked at the curb.

After lunch, we went back and got Cassie again. I had thought we might go to one of the small museums in Hill City, but Joe wasn’t really in the mood, and I wasn’t too excited about them either. So we wandered up and down the streets, which are full of the kind of stores you’d expect in a small, mostly touristy city— souvenirs, gifts, t-shirts, saloons (it is the Wild West, obviously), etc. But we did have to stop in first at the Beef Jerky Outlet. It was right next door to our restaurant, and Cassie was invited in with us. Joe sampled the jerky while i sampled the chocolate cordials. We both found something yummy to take with us, of course. I wandered into a couple of gift shops, but didn’t damage the bank accounts too much. Joe and Cassie sat outside and Cassie shmoozed with passers-by. We crossed the street and checked out an ice cream shop (I had Black Hills Gold flavor ice cream, which was salty caramel with cashews, pralines, and butterfingers candy. It was outstanding!) We sat on the patio in the shade and watched the people go by. It was just so relaxing! Finally, we visited a store with a lot of lawn “whirligigs” outside, and again they invited Cassie in, so we checked out the gifts as well. Hill City was very dog friendly, with a lot of blue bowls of water lining the streets for dogs to have refreshment. We really enjoyed the day.

“Iron Star” is made out of recycled metal items

We finished up with a quick trip to a local winery. I couldn’t resist going in, because they had big ads lining the road for their signature wine, “Red Ass”. I mean, they showed a donkey on the label, but REALLY? Joe stayed in the car with Cassie, while I went in for a tasting. It turned out that Red Ass was a rhubarb wine, of all things. They gave me 5 free tastes (they had a full complement of everything from dry to super sweet Concord grape), and I just did not care for the Red Ass, despite the intriguing name. So I could not in good conscience buy it as a gift for someone. I did buy another bottle of the Cabernet, which surprisingly, I really liked! We’ll see what the family’s expert thinks of South Dakota wine. 

After that, there was nothing to do but stop at the local grocery store, pick up a few things, and head back up the mountain to our campsite. I put the laundry away while Joe did some electrical things (there’s always maintenance going on around here!) and read my book. After dinner tonight, we are going out to look at the stars— there are about a gazillion stars visible from this campground and it is truly amazing so see. They were beautiful last night, and with a cloudless sky all day today, I’m sure they will be just as extraordinary tonight.

Laundry Day

View from tonight's campsite

Wednesday, Aug. 22, 2018 [more photos to follow]

We woke up this morning after a pleasantly rainy and cool night, knowing it was time to leave. Two main reasons: we were out of water (both drinking and in the RV tank), and we were out of underwear. Time to do the laundry!

We drove out of Cascade Campground, immediately encountering a lovely cascading stream. This was Chalk Creek, which we bathed in briefly on Monday. As we continued driving, it was amazing how much more there was to see than there had been in the pitch black on Sunday night!

We headed for Buena Vista, as planned, to the Lost Sock Laundry. It was rather crowded (one lady asked me if I had ever SEEN it this crowded, and I told her I'd never been there before!) I ran 4 washes, but had to wait about 30 minutes before a dryer came free. All in all, it took until about 2pm for me to get everything washed and folded and back into the RV. Meanwhile, Joe walked Cassie and hung out, and dug up a couple of small desert plants for me to bring home.

At this point we were a bit stymied-- we had NO PLANS going forward! With the whole map of Colorado in front of me, I simply couldn't figure out where to go or what to do next. I honestly think the altitude is getting to me-- my brain doesn't have enough oxygen to think straight.One thing we knew, we needed water!

We finally decided to head to Hot Sulphur Springs, a town a couple of hours north, which has a hot springs resort with about 20 pools, or so the ads all say! It was basically just a "why not?" kind of decision, but we certainly DO like these hot springs all over the state! We stopped in Leadville at the grocery store to buy bottled water and a few grocery items, then continued toward Hot Sulphur Springs. Then I noticed on my more detailed maps that we were going very close to a reservoir with several National Forest campgrounds. So we decided to see if they had any room before we continued-- it was already after 6pm. I had to find one with water, however!

Tiny House camped here too

We were lucky-- the first campground we came to had some spaces open, and we were able to fill up the RV's fresh water tank before we docked into our site for the night. It is not as beautiful a campground as Cascade, but it is very nice and certainly okay for one night. The big plus is, it is quite near a town (Frisco) and the phone has 4 bars, so we can get wifi and get caught up on our mail and blogs. Of course, the photos are painfully slow in uploading as usual, so that part will have to wait. I do have a few from today, though, of a couple of very interesting vehicles parked in the campground with us tonight!

"Lil Bandit"

Tomorrow we hope to continue to Hot Sulphur Springs and soak in the hot springs there, and then... I have absolutely NO idea!!