Day 6 - Olny to Glacier

I woke up early the next morning--who am I kidding, I woke up early every morning while camping.  But I woke up early again, and had my muffler on my mind again.  The sky had clouded up overnight, partly why it was so warm the previous night.  As I was laying there thinking about the muffler, I heard a couple taps outside that could have been leaves or twigs falling, but in not too long, I felt moisture on my face and knew that it had started raining.

Chuck and I hadn't been using our rainflys because the weather was nice and we wanted to see stars when possible.  And also, a rainfly is just another thing you have to deal with when you're pitching or breaking camp.  So we hadn't set them up this evening either.  After a few attempts of calling out his name, Chuck woke up and I told him it had started raining.  

We both got out of our tents and went about securing our gear and throwing on our rainflys as quickly as possible.  It was a bit of a Chinese fire drill exercise, but we got all the important stuff covered in the early morning twilight.  As soon as we got back in our tents, the sprinkle tapered off, and that was that.

A little while later, we both got up and had coffee, and while I headed into the woods to take care of business, Chuck took a look at my muffler.  By the time I came back, he had it disassembled and showed me the fresh ding in the bottom of the midpipe.  Sigh. I got it attached and put back together and hoped that that would be the last we had to deal with that.  I'm not sure if it's on there quite right, but it sounds mostly like it should.  While I was working on the muffler, I took a look at my oil since the sight glass was right in front of me, and I was way low, even though I'd done an oil change right before the trip.  I remembered reading that the SV (at least the first gen) likes to burn a little oil on long trips.  It wasn't what I wanted to see, but I wasn't too terribly concerned

Back on the road, bikes intact.

We got out of there with minimal drama, but much like our first camping spot, I was nervous until my bike was sitting safely on the main road.  Our next stop was Whitefish, MT where we gassed up and I got a quart of oil.  Chuck talked to one of the guys at the gas station recommended the Buffalo Cafe, which turned out to be an excellent call. Chuck maintains that it was the best breakfast we had on the whole trip. I preferred Connie's in Sand Point, but either way, if you can't go wrong with either one if you happen to be in the area.

Whitefish was similar to Sandpoint in that it had restaurants with great breakfast food, and an abundance of attractive ladies.  I don't know what they're putting in the water in this part of the country, but I'd like to see it more widely distributed.

We set off towards Glacier, and before the trip, Chuck had mentioned he wanted to stop at a roadside attraction or two, which I was more than fine with.  One place he'd specifically mentioned was the Mystery House of Montana, outside of Columbia Falls.  We found it and stopped there.  We'd hoped to be able to just pay our admission and stroll around at our leisure, but no, we had to be on a guided tour.  

What mysteries lie behind cash register?

Well apparently this time of year is the slow season, and they were pulling some sort of shift where only one guide was present and was taking care of two tours at once.  Our guide was Robert, a short man with a tourist appropriate silly hat, and he sounded like we caught him in between morning cocktails.

I don't know what we were expecting from the mystery house, really.  We certainly weren't expecting to be convinced of mystical vortex powers, but we were expecting at least some sort of kitsch entertainment.  Chuck and I are both smart people, and we both have skeptical dispositions, so as Robert was hurrying through his disjointed and rehearsed spiel, anyone able to read minds would have seen that we were both thinking "bullshit!"  What was especially annoying about Robert's tour was that rather than trying to come up with some vaguely plausible pseudoscientific explanation, his default statement was always "Don't ask me how it happens!  I don't even pretend to know!"  One of the ladies on the tour took a couple pictures of us, where we're standing there, awkwardly wishing we could just leave.

Dude, do you smell something?

Yup, I smell it over here too.

Eventually Robert left us alone to go guide another tour, and we walked around looking at a couple things, such as a random golden door, with cheap spray paint flaking off of it, that led to a bench.  No explanation or optical illusion, just a cheesy gold door.  There was also the "fountain of youth," a cheapo plastic garden fountain, with a piece of paper taped to it that proclaimed it as such.

If only Ponce de Leon knew....

Chuck went to the bathroom before we made our escape, and told me I had to go use it.  I didn't really have to go, but I made myself on Chuck's recommendation.  I immediately saw what he was talking about.  Inside the urinal on the little scented mat thing, was a plastic goalpost with a football suspended in the middle.  As you peed on it, the football would spin on the string.  It was by far the most entertaining part of the mystery house experience.

I did my best John Madden illustration.

From there, we were on to Glacier, which would be the high water mark of our route.  We got there pretty quickly, and everyone we'd talked to about Glacier recommended the Going-to-the-Sun road.  As it turns out, there's really only one road that goes through the park, and that's the road, so we didn't have much trouble finding it.

The informational sign was about a wildfire that destroyed the trees on the other side of the lake.  They're still working on coming back.

The road brought a mixture of emotions.  On the one hand, it's design was awesome, lots of great twists and turns.  And the scenery is simply unparalleled.  I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that it is one of the most beautiful roads in the world.  It covers the breadth of the eponymous glacial canyon and though it's a cliche description, the view is breathtaking.  

If you look closely, you can see where the road leads on the left hillside

The downfall is that since it's such a famous road, and the only road through there, it is heavily used by photographing and slow moving tourists, most of whom have no concept of the etiquette of pulling over to let faster moving traffic through.  And as it turns out, they didn't need the etiquette anyway, as significant portions of the road are under construction now.  There were several spots where it was down to one lane and we had to wait for flaggers, but the worst was a large section under construction that required a pace car to lead the procession through.

We had to wait a while for the other direction of traffic to come through before we could go, and when we did, it was a slog of never exceeding 10 mph, uphill on varying levels of paving.  Needless to say our engines were running hot, and our clutch hands were getting tired.  And by the time the pace car finally pulled away to let us speed up, we were, of course, behind all the traffic that had accumulated, most of which only sped up to about 20 mph.

Eventually, we passed the scenic part and found a picnic area to pull over in and take a breather.  There were several campgrounds scattered around the park, and we both agreed that we wanted to avoid the RV crowd, like we'd experienced at Farragut.  Our best option, we decided, was to go to one of the primitive campgrounds that was first come, first serve.

A nice spot for a break

We stopped at a grocery store to get some supplies for the evening--some canned soup and rolls, and some beer, Pig's Ass Porter (yes, I was sold on the name).  The campsite we were most drawn to was about half an hour away from the park proper, and had about five mile gravel road to get to it.  As we were riding towards it, and having no way of knowing if it was full or not, we both were scoping out potential guerrilla camping opportunities if it came down to it, because we didn't feel like riding back down that road, especially since it was getting late by then.

Nice splatter on a freshly cleaned visor

The road to the campground...would there be a site for us?

As it turned out, our fears were unfounded. There were something like 19 sites total at the campground, and only a few of them had residents.  We picked a spot and I went to the registration board to get an envelope and saw that there was a notice that gathering firewood was illegal in the park except for designated areas (which we weren't in).  

I told Chuck the bad news and neither of us were stoked, because we'd heard that Glacier gets cold at night, no matter the season, and the closest place we knew to buy firewood was half an hour away.  There was a ranger in the campground doing rangerly things, and Chuck asked him about the firewood situation.  The guy was younger than we were, and seemed to be pretty cool.  He informed us that yes, gathering firewood in the park was indeed illegal.  However, the area outside of the campground, about a mile back up the road, was not national park land, so therefore outside of his jurisdiction.  Wink wink.

With that in mind, after Chuck and I had set up camp and relaxed a bit, we set off up the road, equipped with The Choppah.  We found a spot outside the gates and quickly made our way to the fringe of the woods to find some dead wood that wasn't too rotten for burning, and that could fit on Chuck's bike.

As it happened, there was a bunch of wood for the grabbing, but a lot of it came equipped with stabbers.  Not thorns, really, but little spiky nubs that didn't feel too good when you grabbed them.  Somehow in his haste, Chuck got a little too rough with one, and the next thing he knew he was bleeding.  It wasn't anything that justified stitches, but it was enough to look at it and say "Holy shit, dude!"

Holy shit, dude!

In not too long, we had a good haul of wood, plenty enough for the evening for the two of us.  We strapped it to Chuck's bike and it worked surprisingly well.  Chuck had his tie down straps, and the wood bundle, while precarious and a little bouncy, was secure.  I don't think we even lost a twig en route.

Our successful plunder

We got our fire going back at camp, and dined on some Dinty Moore and Campbell's Chunky, fortified with chunks of bread and canned corn.  It actually wasn't too bad at all.  It was hot and hearty, and I wasn't complaining.

Glacier is in bear country, and all the sites had bear boxes where we were supposed to put any food items, in case a bear wandered into camp.  As it turned out, we saw no bears, but plenty of cows.  The neighboring land, where we pilfered our firewood, was free range cattle land, and the cattle had wandered into the park.  So while we didn't see any bears or elk, we did get to listen to some moos here and there.

As predicted, Glacier got cold, but we were prepared for it, and we both slept without issue that night.

Day 5 Farragut to Olny-ish

The next morning, we didn't hurry too much to get our stuff together.  We knew we were headed towards Glacier, but weren't sure where we'd end up.  We both decided to grab one last shower, because who knew when our next chance would be?

I'm fairly certain the bottles are just empties left over from the previous evening.

I waited a little too long to grab mine, and had to wait in line for a shower to become available, but it came soon enough and it felt great.

 

We packed our stuff and headed out, but stopped by the bathroom on the way before hitting the road.  We rode back past our site on the way out, and saw the camp hosts scrubbing it clean--literally scrubbing.  I guess they thought that we'd partied too hard, and it had been too much debauchery for a family friendly campground. It was a bit embarrassing, and we got the hell out of there.

Since we hadn't seen the lake in our whole stay, we decided to take a look before leaving the park.  We went to a scenic overlook, and learned that Lake Pend Oreille (pronounced "pond door-ray") is the 5th largest lake in the US, and is deep enough to apparently facilitate submarine maneuvers.  So needless to say, the thing is HUGE, and it was strange that in all our cruising around the park, we hadn't seen it before then.  In any case, you can only look at a lake for so long, so after getting a good eyeful, we headed out. As it turns out, we would spend a lot of time seeing the lake for the rest of the morning anyway.

Lake Pend Oreille 

We stopped in Sandpoint, ID for some breakfast and found a good place, Connie's Cafe.  It was a nice day and not too hot yet, so we decided to eat on the porch.  The food was great, I had the Country Breakfast, which was biscuits & gravy, with another biscuit, and some eggs and sausage.  It was good rib stickin' food.  I should also add that Sandpoint, seemed to be filled with lots of attractive ladies.  When I think of Idaho, I typically think of small towns and farms, and not really a boon of hot girls.  Well, Sandpoint definitely proved me wrong.  There were hot girls aplenty, but we were just passing through, and there was no room on our bikes anyway so it wouldn't do any good to linger on it.

We headed off eastward and then north along Bull River Road, a road that some guys had recommended to us at breakfast.  It followed along a lake, and they raved about how great it was for motorcycles.  When we located it on the map, It looked good to us too, but when we cruised the road, we weren't all that impressed. Yeah, it was better than straight and boring, but as far as motorcycles go, or at least sportbikes, it was pretty sedate.

By the time we got to the end of that road, we were getting hot, so pulled over at a rest stop.  There was an old timer there on an old trike, a chopper made with a VW engine.  It looked straight out of the 70's and so did he.  He was cool, and we just chatted a bit about riding and motorcycles and such.  He too also raved about Bull River Road, saying how it was one of his favorites of all time and such.  It makes me curious about buying a cruiser, maybe roads automatically become more exciting when you have a slower, less nimble machine?  In any case, he geared up and soon headed off, wishing us a good trip and warning us to keep an eye out for deer.

Our route took us along Lake Koocanusa, or Cookin' USA as we dubbed it.  Looking at it later, I see that the name is  actually a conjunction of Kootenai (the river it dams), Canada and USA, since it  crosses the border.  The road was smooth and scenic, and we were able to go at a pretty good clip along the length of it.  

Taking a breather somewhere in Idaho. Or maybe Montana.

We stopped along the way for gas at a small general store type place in the middle of nowhere.  While I was getting all my gear situated, an old farmer came and talked to us with a very concerned look on his face.  He asked us where we were headed, and Chuck explained that we were taking side roads and such.  Hearing that he seemed to grow more concerned and said that staying on the main highways is safer, and that we should be on the lookout for deer, regardless.  Seeing as that was our second warning in a few hours, we agreed that we'd be extra vigilant.

Not too much later, as luck would have it, we were going at speed and I was riding point, when I noticed a familiar four legged shape by the side of the road.  I flashed my brakes and immediately started downshifting and braking.  Chuck followed suit. A doe was standing on the side of the road looking at me with that "duuuuuuh" look that deer like to give when they see a vehicle.  I'd almost come to a stop and honked my little weenie motorcycle horn, until she snapped out of it and proceeded to run across the road.  A moment later, two fawns hopped out of the woods and followed mom across. The deer hadn't caught us off guard, really, but it was a wake up call.

The light was fading and we knew that the conditions would just become more deer filled, so we agreed that it was time to look for a place to camp for the night.  The closest "town" was a place called Olny, so we figured we'd stop there and get some provisions for the night.  This was also bear country, so we didn't want to eat any meat or anything, and just planned on getting something to snack on.

We pulled into Olny, which was a small cluster of houses and other buildings by the train tracks, and one store.  I think that Chuck and I can both agree that the Olny store was the most surreal experience of the trip.  Most small towns, when a motorcyclist pulls up to a store, packed for a long haul and covered in road patina, he can expect a little chit chat about the trip.  The lady who was running the store, a dour woman in her 50's or 60's, couldn't have cared less that we were on motorcycles, or that we were on a trip.  In truth, she seemed annoyed to actually have customers.

And the store itself was weird...some things like drinks and chips she had a decent stock of, but for most of the goods, there was only one of each item on the shelves.  You want Froot Loops?  Well you're in luck, because we have one box left!  A can of soup? Yes, we have one!  The goods were all arranged neatly too, labels out and parallel with their neighbors, as if it were a museum of common consumer goods.

We got some pretzels and some waters for a cool $10 and proceeded to GTFO.  Since we were in Montana by now, we figured we wouldn't have much trouble finding an unpopulated area to set up camp for the night, and we turned off when we saw a sign for National Forrest access.  It was one of those roads where we'd think that we were miles away from anyone, but then a house would appear around the next bend.  Eventually though, we came to a gravel road, which is a good sign for that you're getting farther from civilization. We turned down it and and looked for a site to camp.

We found a spot to with wheel tracks leading into the woods, and Chuck set off to investigate.  He was communicating via the Sena and commented that it looked promising.  I saw him disappear behind a little hill, so headed after him.  Just as he was telling me it looked like we'd found our spot, I felt a clang and heard the dreaded "BLAP BLAP BLAP" of my exhaust again.  I'd scraped another rock and disconnected the muffler, just like last time, only in less dire circumstances.

I was slightly bummed about it, but after seeing how easily Chuck fixed it last time, I wasn't too concerned.  In any case, we'd found our site for the evening because we sure as hell weren't going anywhere now. I cut the engine and Chuck came to give me a push down the hill to our site.

It turned out to be a pretty good site, though in retrospect, we were a little too close to the road, even if it was only gravel.  It was mostly flat, and we were close to a stream, although the only part of the stream that was easily reachable from our site was a stagnant green pool. We set about building a fire pit with rudimentary tools (e.g. a couple of branches).  Neanderthalish as our methods were, they worked. We saw that we weren't the first people there, there was evidence of a previous fire, as well as many small trees and branches that had been chainsawed.  We gathered some fallen wood and chopped it up into manageable pieces with The Choppah.

Not a bad spot.

Pretty discreet, but still visible to the eagle eyed passerby

We had a good night of snack food and whatever libations we had on hand.  We actually agreed that the fire turned out to be unnecessary, as it was actually a fairly warm night since the clouds had rolled in.  Before too long, we covered up the fire with the dirt we used to dig the fire pit, and went to bed.

 Day 4 - Farragut

The first order of business at Farragut was disc golf--it was after all, pretty much the whole reason we camped there.  After reading reviews on DGCR, we decided that A.W.O.L. was the first course we should play.  it was the longest and most difficult, so we figured it would be best to do that one first while we were still fresh and the sun wasn't hot.  

Part of the fun of the Farragut experience was that our campsite was a couple miles or so from where the disc golf courses were.  Naturally, we didn't want to walk all the way there, nor did we want to deal with the hassle of trying to stow our bike gear.  There are apparently no helmet laws in Idaho, so Chuck and I decided to live like the locals and rode over there in full squid status.  I can safely say I don't like riding like a squid, I felt exposed and cold, and douchey.

The course turned out to be pretty good, we figured it was about the same difficulty level of Seatac back home, but with more space to work with, and no blackberries.  It definitely was less grueling than Four Mounds, being flat for the most part, and having less rocks to scrabble over with each step.  Neither of us kept track of score, as far as I know, but I think we shot fairly decently for being out of practice. Even though we had the early start, it got hot soon enough, and towards the end of the round we were running pretty low on energy and water.

Chuck taking the picturesque route to the basket.

Some of the holes were creatively renamed.  I liked this one.

We finished up the round, squidded back to camp, took a quick breather and then loaded up our dirty clothes and headed to Spirit Lake. We had errands to run and chores to do.  Once we got into town, we put a load of laundry in at the laundromat, and then walked across the street to a little food truck type operation called "As You R" that specialized in burgers and fish and chips.  We both ordered burgers from the quite attractive chick running the place.  We sat outside on a tiny picnic table and when the food came out, it was everything we'd hoped for.  In essence, it was everything that Zip's was not--and cheaper to boot. It might have been just as simple burger and (steak) fries, but it was done right.

Cool as Ice.

"Yo, where da ladies at?"

I'll go out on a limb and say these were the best burgers in town.

After our meal, I went to finish the laundry while Chuck went to secure food for the evening. While hanging out in the laundromat, an older couple chatted with me about our trip and all. They both seemed really excited and happy for us, and they definitely did not seem to have a negative stereotype of motorcyclists (good thing they hadn't seen me after our round.) Just more friendliness in Spirit Lake. 

By the time I got over to help Chuck shop, he was already in the checkout line.  He'd gotten some chicken and veggies for hobo packs again, hoping for better results than what we'd had at Four Mounds. While the laundry was finishing drying, we took a stroll over to the local liquor store and got a bottle of Bulleit, for at least $10 cheaper than what we'd pay in Washington.

Recharged and loaded with clean clothes and supplies, we went back to Farragut.  There was still plenty of daylight and we had energy, so we headed to the disc golf courses again to check out another of Farragut's offerings.  The two remaining courses to pick between were North Star and Wreckreator. Not having much preference, we only hoped to have a couple holes play by the water, but weren't sure which courses did.  The "map" provided at the entrance to the courses didn't do much for indication, but it looked like both courses should play by the lake at some point.  With about as much reason as a coin flip, we chose Wreckreator.

It was a good course, but like A.W.O.L., it didn't really have anything that stood out as great.  It was more forgiving than the former, but in recalling the round, there are only a couple holes I can really bring to memory.  And it never played by the water.

One of the vestiges of the old naval base

Northern Idaho countryside

Though the course was easier, Chuck and I were tired by the end, and if we had been keeping score, we probably would have done worse in our afternoon round.  We finished up golfing and headed back to camp for dinner.  

JC Whitney cases: More than just a fashion statement.

Chuck made up some hobo packs, though rather than putting everything into one pack, he tried separating the meat and veggies into separate packs so that the meat wouldn't get overdone.  He had 1" cubes of chicken seasoned with white wine, cumin, salt and pepper.  He was planning on coating everything with a cream of mushroom sauce he made up, but, um, that didn't go as planned.

At one point, he wanted me to take a picture of the packs cooking in the coals, so I got up to get my camera from the picnic table.  In my defense, it was dark out, and there were many things on the table, including the camp stove with the sauce.  And we had been drinking beer and whiskey.  I grabbed the camera easily enough, but as I turned around, the lanyard snagged on something and the next thing I knew, there was an intense, searing sensation across my feet.  Yup, that was the stove the lanyard had snagged on, and yes, it was indeed filled with creamy, boiling sauce.  I think I yelled some not so family friendly things and did a panic dance, kicking off my Crocs in the process, as most of the sauce had collected there.  We rinsed my feet in cold water from the spigot, and fortunately, they were just superficial burns, but alas, there would be no sauce for the meal.

I've seen similar looking scenes that happened in an entirely different manner.

Believe it or not, I think the Crocs actually helped me here.

As it turned out, it didn't really need it.  The chicken came out really well, and the potatoes too.  The mixed veggies (onions and pepper) were kind of bland, but that was because they had been intended to be covered in sauce.

It wasn't long after eating that we were ready to call it a night. Even though we'd had a rest day in terms of riding, we still ended up being more active. We weren't sure where we'd end up the next night, somewhere on the way to Glacier is all we knew.

Sunrise at Four Mounds

Day 3 - 26 Aug Spokane to Farragut State Park

We woke up to sunshine and set about getting our morning coffee and such.  We took our morning constitutionals in a nearby shack equipped with a toilet.  The shack was interesting, I told Chuck it was like a disc golf themed crack den, and he agreed it was a perfect description.  

Gordy and his wife were in the process of building a house on the property, an ongoing project that they’ve been working on.  We took a stroll around the place to see how it was coming along, and it seems to be a really nice house.  The notable oddity though was the kitchen. Gordy and his wife are both tall people, and as such, they designed the kitchen with their stature in mind. The kitchen, while well equipped and laid out nicely, had extremely high counters, closer to what you'd expect a bar's height to be.  It made us feel like we should be standing on a stool and looking for the cookie jar.  

Since I hadn’t been hugely productive with my journaling the previous night with Gordy outside the tent, I wanted to catch up some more.  Back out on the porch, I found the makings for an ad hoc desk and set about to getting things documented.  

Having some coffee in my "study"

I'd has some issues with my Buell pegs earlier in the trip. They didn't come with springs on them, like my stock pegs had. I didn't think it would be an issue though, as gravity should keep them in the downward position, right? What I hadn't taken into account that if I were riding at speed, the wind would be plenty enough force to push them upward if I were to take my feet off the pegs. This led to a few awkward moments on the previous days’ rides when a foot peg would fly up into the retracted position and I ended up kicking my leg like a dog getting its back scratched as I tried to get it back down.  Certainly not the safest maneuver to be performing on winding roads, and furthermore, any cool points I may have previously accumulated were automatically deducted.

Not one to sit idly by, Chuck decided to get MacGyvery with my footpegs while I typed away.  Armed with some pliers, a Leatherman, and some scavenged surveyor’s flags, Chuck did a not too shabby job of rigging up some springs for my pegs.  They seem like the only time they’ll come off is if I purposefully want to take them off, but I don’t really see why I’d want to do that.

Chuck's roadside engineering

We wanted to make good time, so packed up all our stuff before heading out to play Cape Fear, the signature course of Four Mounds.  We also wanted and make it out before Gordy showed up (apparently there’s a group of regulars that always play on Sundays).  Chuck got his bike all loaded up, and I just got all my things consolidated, ready for loading when we got back.

We played Cape Fear with only a couple hiccups in trying to find our way around (the multiple courses on the property sometimes overlap and it’s hard to determine which way you should go).  The day was quickly getting hot though, and we were going through water like it was...well, water.  The course is pretty big and rugged, with lots of lava-rock filled elevation, and stabby plants everywhere.  The course takes its name from Hole 9, which itself is called Cape Fear.  It shoots over 500’ across a nasty ravine where if end up short and/or left (the most common direction for weak/bad throws) there’s a good chance that you’ll never see your disc again.  Or if you do, you’ll likely come back bloody.  I forget what Chuck and I scored on that hole, but we both came out intact and with all our discs, so we were winners.  As tired as we were after that though, it was hard to believe we were only halfway through the round.

The eponymous hole.  If you zoom in, you can see a white dot to the right of the trees.  That's the  pin.

Spokane Valley from the other side of Cape Fear (basket lower right)

If you look closely, you can see two wild turkeys in the center.

One of the interesting holes on the course

Where the hell are we supposed to be shooting?

One of many baskets scattered around.

On hole 15, Gordy's truck came around the corner, and he had Wobbly Bob with him.  Bob is another big disc golf guy in Spokane and they were going around doing some maintenance before the Sunday rounds would start.  We shot the shit a while with them, talking about our tentative route and general disc golf small talk.  We didn’t want to be impolite, but we wanted to finish the round, get on the road and get some food in our stomachs.

We moseyed on and they took off to do more maintenance, until the 18th hole where they caught up again to throw the final hole with us.  We all had good shots, but Bob parked it.  Chuck asked Gordy if we could hitch a ride back to camp, and we hopped in the back of the truck. Gordy then took us to another corner of the property, in the opposite direction of our campsite, to show off a new hole he'd just put in.  We apparently weren't done with golf just yet.  It was soon over though and we were back towards the camp.  

A couple sportbikes grazing in the wild

For whatever reason, it took me way longer than necessary to get my shit together and Chuck was obviously losing patience with my lagging.  We were hungry, it was hot (especially in leathers), and it had been a while since he'd had a cigarette.  I felt bad, because I sure as hell wanted to get out of there too, but everything just seemed to take so long to get in place.  

Finally though we were on the road and looking for something to eat.  We'd wanted breakfast again, but it was too late for the place that Gordy had recommended, so we were just looking for anything that looked good.  Somehow though, we found a stretch of Spokane were no good restaurants exist.  We rode up and down several roads and it began to feel like the time we couldn't escape Yakima.  Tired of looking, Chuck made the call and pulled into a place called Zip's, which turned out to be a regional fast food burger chain.  

It was...food.  I can't say much more for it than that. My burger was basically McDonald's burger with Wendy's bacon on top and the fries were eerily similar to the frozen crinkle cut fries I've undercooked in my own kitchen.  The highlight was the soda machine that dispensed about 500 different flavors.  We scarfed the food down as best we could, tried not to dwell on it, and headed towards Idaho.

Our destination for the next two nights was Farragut State Park, a popular park on a former naval base.  Yes.  A naval base.  In Idaho.  Idaho, as it turns out, has lots of huge lakes, and this particular one, Pend Doreille, was large and deep enough that the US Navy had a training station there during WWII.  Now in more peaceful times, it's a state park and like Four Mound, has several disc golf courses on site.  

We were looking for a back way to Farragut, of course, and according to Google, there was a sweet road leading up and over Mt. Spokane.  We took it, and there were some pretty cool twisties on the way up, but our fun soon came to an end when we saw that it became a fee road, and that the road would be gravel at best on the other side of the summit, if we could find the correct one.  Kind of a bummer because turning around would make it about a 40 minute diversion, but there wasn’t much else to be done. So, heads hung low, we turned around, headed back, and found Blanchard Road, a road that Gordy mentioned, which led straight into Idaho.  It was a pretty cool road in parts, some of it having fresh virginal asphalt laid down where no lines even been painted yet. There were some nice turns over the crest of the hills on the border and Chuck wanted to turn around to have another run at them. But at that point, I was pretty pooped and just wanted to get to Farragut, so we forged ahead.

We made it into Idaho and headed south towards Farragut and stopped in a little town called Spirit Lake that seemed to be exceedingly friendly and had a nice little grocery store with a laundromat, several restaurants, gas stations and a liquor store.  Pretty much all  a weary traveller could ask for.  We got some easy food for the evening at the grocery store, some sandwiches and potato salad, and headed to Farragut which was only about 20 minutes away.

In order to get a spot at Farragut, we had to reserve online and by the time we were trying to do it, there were only two campsites available.  One with water and electricity in the RV area, and one in the tent area, with no water or electricity, that was right by the bathrooms and camp host. I had tried to consult with Chuck, but was unable to reach him, so I made an executive decision to go for the RV site, figuring that it would probably be quieter and wouldn't have to worry about the camp hosts so much.

Well, in hindsight, we may have been better off with the tent site.  The RV site, while having nice amenities like a picnic table, firepit, water and electricity, lacked any sort of personality.  It was a basic slab of asphalt with a rectangle of gravel attached.  And there were lots of families, with lots of kids.  They were generally well behaved, but still, there was always noise and commotion around.  On the plus side we only had one neighbor.  And while we were settling in to the campsite, a not-unattractive mom walked by with her young daughter.  The little girl was utterly transfixed by us--greasy, smelly, leathery visages that we were.  The mom  started chastising her playfully, telling her  she was “too young to be interested in boys...cute boys,” and glanced at us with a bit of a cougarish gleam in her eye.  I think she may have had a couple glasses of wine, but she nonetheless made two scruffy dirtbags blush.

We had our sandwiches and potato salad for dinner, and treated ourselves to some nice hot showers. They were the first we'd had since departing on Friday, and they hit the spot.

 Our not-so-special campsite