Phew! 2

Finally getting back to writing more about our trip home after I left off  here. We left San Diego on Friday and headed for Las Vegas to see an old friend. We met in high school, roomed together for some of college (she finished, I didn't) and mostly keep in touch meeting in R.I. when she comes back to visit her mom. I was excited about seeing Karen and Tom in their home and mildly disappointed when their son opened the door and said neither parent was home yet. However, it turned out Karen needed emergency surgery that night and we never got to visit at all. Very disappointing but so glad she is recovering just fine!

We left early to get out of their hair and headed north through Utah. We decided to take the slightly longer road through Zion National Park, which was beautiful and well worth it.

However. The road started to wind up again, as we saw this tiny opening in the cliff ahead.

Ameranth hopped out to check out a marker and told us that:

I hadn't had any problems with the mountain roads so far, despite my pre-trip worries.  This, though, this could be a problem. I didn't think I could drive across some bridge to get to that hole in the wall and started anticipating the humiliation of doing a U-turn and driving back all those miles through the park. Imagine my relief when we saw this ahead:

That tiny hole we saw? Turned out to be a 'window' opening in the tunnel. When I uploaded photos later, I found that Ameranth might have eased my mind had she read the plaques as she snapped the pics.

We zipped through Utah, managing a glimpse of Salt Lake as we drove by and got to Idaho, which is remarkably flat in the south.

 

We headed northwest through Oregon to Washington, for a special meeting on Tuesday in Bellevue. (It was very geekily exciting for us, but I am not at liberty to write about it yet)

Cattle, windmills and mountains.

Just after driving into Washington, we had to pass through a dust storm which luckily didn't cover the road for long.

As we left the plains behind and headed over Snoqualmie Pass towards Seattle the weather changed a bit.

Soon we were driving in whiteout conditions which really slowed us down. We made it safely to Bellevue with just enough daylight to scope out our top-secret destination for the next day and get to a motel.

****very fun Tuesday which will only be interesting to us, then headed east out of town*****

We stopped after crossing the Columbia River to get a picture of the Vantage Bridge Wild Horses Sculpture. 

We also stopped for gas in Ritzville and got a couple of nice pictures as we drove through the small town.

Our next goal was Kalispell, Montana and my cousin Steve's house. I think I've mentioned that I hadn't seen him for about 30 years and had never met his wife Lisa, or their son Dalton, but thanks to the family emails it was like seeing old friends.

Montana was beautiful and I hope I get to visit again in warmer weather- and for longer. Ameranth and I were off in the morning, sadly leaving Sally there to stay over Thanksgiving, then fly home to Florida. We had a lot of fun with her on the road.

I'll try not to take as long with the final leg of the trip- I know certain relatives and friends have been waiting!