Episode 3. Week Two, May 31- June 6
After saying goodbye to all of our bowling friends in the wee hours of Friday night, actually Saturday morning, we knew that we needed to sleep in before hitting the road. I don’t think we got to bed before 2:00 am. We dumped our tanks, took on some water, and left a very hot Las Vegas to begin our trip to Canada and Alaska in earnest.
Our next stop was another national forest campground near Ely, NV. Ward Mountain Campground is located in the Humboldt-Yoiyabe National Forest. It had no hookups of any kind, and in fact, they were even having issues with their few water connections, so it was a good thing that we knew to take on some water before leaving Las Vegas. Not knowing anything about this small campground in advance, we were surprised to find some amazing views from our quite spacious site. And, with a senior discounted price of $14 ($6 per night plus an $8 per reservation booking fee), it was an amazing place to spend the evening. It was quite cool there, being at an elevation of about 7,400-feet, so we had no need for air-conditioning. If we’re ever passing through that area again, we may try to stay and take advantage of some of the hiking, along with a trek to the summit of nearby Murry Summit (10,800-feet).
On Monday, we continued our way north by stopping at a Harvest Host location near Buhl, ID. The Holesinsky Vineyard and Winery was a nice little place and we stayed the night along with three other families. This was the first time that we’d ever stayed the night in our fifth wheel in the state of Idaho. Idaho brought the total number of states we’ve stayed in our trailer to 43, and that’s all since 2018. Prior to this trip, we had only driven through Idaho once on our way to Yellowstone National Park.
Even with getting a bit of a late start on Tuesday, we managed to find time for a brief, rainy stop at Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument in Hagerman, ID. Our stop later that night was yet another Harvest Host location. This time it was the Elkhorn Lavender Farm in Baker City, OR. The location was right at the base of the snowcapped Elkhorn Mountain Range. Cliff, the owner, was a retired forestry service employee and had a really interesting presentation that he gave that chronicled his transition into growing and processing lavender. This stay not only added a 44th state to our trailer travels, it also represented the 50th state that both Debbie and I have ever visited.
From there, we moved to our last US location just to the west side of Spokane, WA, making this our 45th state to host our trailer for an evening. Here we stayed three nights in a fairly new campground that is owned by the Northern Quest Casino and Resort. The campground is located a block or two from the casino and hotel complex, but we never took the time to go to the casino. We had already been to Las Vegas, so had seen enough casinos for one trip. We had a couple of reasons for staying at this location. The first, was that we wanted a last stop in the States to do laundry, dump tanks, and take on water before heading into Canada.
The second reason for stopping in Spokane was that this is where our niece, Ashley, flew to join us. She’ll be with us for approximately the next six weeks as we travel up through Canada and into Alaska. She’ll be with us until we get to Fairbanks. Her trip to meet us wasn’t without some drama. While she was supposed to leave DFW on Wednesday evening and arrive in Spokane around 8:30 pm, several flight delays caused her to not arrive until about 1:30 a.m. As you can imagine, all of us were pretty tired by the end of it all.
What we didn’t expect to find in Spokane was just how nice the downtown area was, especially all of the park space along the Spokane River. The town was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the 1974 World’s Fair that “put Spokane on the map”. The paved walks, pavilions, and other attractions made for quite an enjoyable morning. The falls along the Spokane River was really pretty and we even took a sky tram ride over the falls. I could see coming back here to spend a little more time. After spending the morning walking along the river, then eating lunch, we decided to take the short drive over to Coeur d’Alene, ID. We had heard so much about how the park and marina area around the lake were quite beautiful, but we didn’t really find it as impressive as Spokane.
We’ll be crossing the border into Canada on Friday and we’re really looking forward to taking our trailer into another country for this first time. Follow along as we go on this new adventure.
LyndDebTravel 