Trip Resumption

As Willie would say, we're "On the Road Again".

After a couple of weeks in Atlanta, where we roasted in 100 plus temperatures after having our central air go caplooey, we flew back to Seattle on Wednesday. Our next door neighbor and surrogate daughter, Jasenda, was kind enough to take us to the bus stop early Wednesday morning. We rode the the bus to the Five Points Marta Station and then the train to the airport. Steven and Elizabeth picked us up at the airport in Seattle, and we went directly to Safeco Field to see the Mariners play an afternoon game with the Minnesota Twins. Lance Barksdale, Major League umpire and son of our good friends Bob and Margaret Barksdale of Jackson, MS, was on First Base and was kind enough to get great tickets for the four of us. Although the Mariners lost, it was a fun afternoon.

After the game, we walked from the stadium to Steven and Elizabeth's apartment just west of downtown Seattle. The horizontal distance from the stadium to the apartment is not that bad--about a mile or mile and a half, I suspect--but the vertical distance is a killer. Luckily, Steven and Elizabeth have figured out which buildings in the downtown area have inside escalators that you can enter on one street and exit on a higher street. That saved us some pretty steep climbs.

Lois and I were bushed and jet-lagged after the game, since we had gotten up at 1:45 a.m. Pacific Time to make it to the airport, so we flaked out pretty early.

Thursday we were lazy for most of the day until we went shopping around noon. We bought some linens for the cabin in Taos and then went to Trader Joes for some essentials like chocolate chip cookies for Taos as well.

Thursday evening after work, Emily came by Steven and Elizabeth's. Elizabeth wanted to take some family pictures, since we all have not been together at one time for quite a while. We went to the roof of their apartment building, and Elizabeth took some pictures of the whole group, and I took some pictures of my three girls. Maybe Elizabeth will send me some of the pictures she took and I'll post one of those to the blog as well.

We had a good dinner at one of our traditional favorites, "Old Spaghetti Warehouse", and then Emily took Lois and me, along with a car load of luggage and linens to Port Townsend with her. For those not familiar with the Puget Sound area, this involves taking a ferry across the sound and driving a considerable distance, which Emily does every day. We got in around 11:00 p.m., and went right to bed in our motorhome, which we had left parked in Emily's yard.

Friday, we puttered around for most of the day repacking the motor home for our trip back east, dumping the holding tanks, etc., while Emily spent the day working from home. We had a nice lunch at a little restaurant down by the marina in Port Townsend. Late in the afternoon, Lois and I combined taking Emily's two boxers, Stella and Annie, for a walk with a trip to the local supermarket. They're active dogs, but a lot of fun.

This morning we left Port Townsend around 10:00 a.m., drove to the ferry which goes to Edmonds, WA, and went north from Edmonds to Everett, WA, where we picked up U.S. Highway 2 to head east. Highway 2, which runs from the west coast all the way to Bar Harbor, Maine, is one of the old transcontinental routes like Route 66. We're not going all the way to Bar Harbor this time, but will take it all the way to Glacier NP in Montana. The route from Everett through the Cascades was beautiful, but less so, I thought, than the Highway 20 route which we took west. We did stop for one beautiful waterfall alongside the road.

Leaving the Cascades, you drive along the Wenatchee River to its confluence with the Columbia through one of the most productive fruit growing regions in the country. Of course we had to stop for a basket of fresh fruit straight from the orchard which we enjoyed with our dinner tonight.

After leaving the Columbia valley, you're back in wheat growing country. Most of the wheat had been harvested between the time we went to Seattle and our return. Still the scenery is stunning. The rolling hills covered by golden wheat stubble in patterns left by the combines is really beautiful. We stopped several times for pictures along the way.

Tonight we're camped at a very small RV park in a very small town in Eastern Washington. When I turned my computer on, I was surprised to see that the RV park or someone nearby has an unsecured wireless network that I could access.

Tomorrow night at this time, we plan to be camped in or near Glacier NP.

More later.