Western Trip #2 Day 7: From Glacier National Park, Montana to Portland, Oregon via Idaho and Washingon-July 14, 2019

Today was always going to be a long day. There was nothing we could do about it. We had a lot of miles to cover.
My daughter J and I got up before 7 and enjoyed more of our breakfast supplies with a nice view out our window. J went up to the office to get ice from the cooler outside. She filled our ice container, while I packed things up. We checked out at 8:16 and were on the road with the odometer reading 42921. Driving out past the entrance to Glacier National Park, I was really glad once again, that we had come back this year.
At 9:08 (42953), we parked in the lot of Risen Christ Catholic Church in Evergreen, which is outside of Kalispell, for the 9:30 Mass. The church was in a fan shape, like many suburban churches, and there is a social room and kitchen attached to it. It was a lot more modern looking than the one we went to in Kalispell two years ago. This one has a Saturday evening Mass and then this is the only one on Sunday. Daily Mass is only Monday- Thursday and those are the only days the office has hours. The parish was formally established in 1978 and this building was completed in 1981. The church was simple and attractive.

 The pastor's sermon was good, but some of the Prayers of the Faithful struck us as a little too conservative for us.
 We made use of the restrooms, not knowing where the next ones would be, and reprogrammed the GPS before leaving at 10:52. Our route took us down US 93, which had a lovely run along the western side of Flathead Lake before Elmo,MT, where we got on Montana Rte. 28 cutting across the Flathead Reservation. There wasn't anything about the area that seemed any different than the surrounding area.

At Plains Montana, Rte. 28 ended and we turned onto Rte. 200 southbound. At the intersection with MT 135, we took a right. J did her work on her sister's wedding table favors and kept us on radio stations with music we liked. It was actually amazing that we were getting these stations way out here. We were traveling through the valley formed by the Clark Fork River and it was rather mountainous around us. So, it never occurred to me to ask the city girl to take over.
At St. Regis, we turned onto I-90 westbound. St. Regis was the closest thing to a town that we'd see for a while. Although we were theoretically headed west, we were going northwest, which wasn't logical, considering our destination. However, these are the available roads out here.
At 1:25 (43097), I happily pulled into the Dena Mora Rest Area westbound. I really needed the break. We read the signs about the area, as usual. I realized that I truly couldn't drive any more. So, we rolled down the windows, I put my seat back and went to sleep, after telling J to wake me in 30 minutes. She continued to do needlework, of course.

J woke me on time and we headed off again at 1:52. Five minutes later, just after Exit 0 in Montana, we crossed into Idaho and the Pacific Time Zone. That extra hour we gained when we turned our watches back an hour would come in handy for this long drive. However, it is really weird that this is where the time zone changes. Idaho is in both Mountain and Pacific Time Zones, but unlike other states, which do this along a vertical line, Idaho does it on a horizontal. The panhandle-the northern portion- of the state is in the Pacific zone and the southern, fatter portion, is in Mountain. I don't think any other state does it this way.

We were in need of gas and food. Finally, we saw both conveniently located to the highway at Exit 49 in Kellogg, which took us onto Bunker Avenue and from there to W. Cameron Avenue. Our first stop was at 1:20 PDT (43126) at the Conoco, where gas was $2.999 per gallon. Luckily, we only needed 6.67 gallons. No, we weren't in "need", I guess, but gas stations had been few and far between.
1:29 found us about a block away at the McDonald's. I got the Tomato Mozzarella Grilled Chicken meal for $8.05 and J got the Crispy Chicken Sandwich meal for $7.53. We took advantage of their free WiFi, while we ate.
Off again at 2:16, there were more mountains and valleys to go through. It was not the speediest. At 3:15 (43167), we took a break at the rest stop just west of Coeur d'Alene. We made it quick and were on the road again in 4 minutes.
We had wonderful views of the huge Lake Coeur d'Alene. What a beautiful day to go with the view!

At 3:26 (43176), we crossed into Washington. Immediately, we were in the outskirts of Spokane. Just west of town, I-90 dipped southwest. Soon, the land seemed drier. It was definitely flatter. These two pictures were taken by J at 4:39 and 4:47. You can see that it was very unexciting land. It was a small thrill to see those farm buildings in the distance.

At Moses Lake,we stopped for gas at 5:08 (43296) at a 76 station. We got 5.7 @$3.39, the highest price yet.  We continued south on WA 17, while I-90 went off to the west. The land was arid and irrigation was used on the farmland.
At Mesa, 17 merged with US 395. At Kennewick, we crossed the Columbia River for the first time. The terrain isn't exciting there, but the river looked good.

This looked like a good place to stop for dinner. While we needed it to be quick, we wanted it to be someplace that we didn't really have at home. So, at 6:32 (43369), we pulled into the parking lot of a Carl's Jr. in West Kennewick. I got the Original Thickburger Combo for $11.16 and it wasn't bad. J got the Famous Star without cheese and a medium soda for $8.65. She said it was good.

We were on the road again at 7. We headed down I-82 to Plymouth to cross the river again, which we did before 7:30. Now, we were in Oregon, our sixth state of the trip and fourth today. I had wanted to get to Portland this way to show J the Columbia River Gorge. While I'd not been this far out, I had seen the western end and it was gorgeous (no pun intended). I wanted to see this end, too.
Over the river, we turned onto US 730, which took us to I-84, which ran through the gorge. At this end, it was still rather flat. It was warm, though. At 7:58, we saw that it was 88 degrees. Five minutes later, we could see the terrain on either side of the river getting higher.

We were near Arlington at 8:08 and that sky was getting prettier. J took photos with both phones, as well as my camera.

The view of the cliffs on my side was pretty dramatic. I can do a decent job of taking a photo without looking at the view screen, while driving.

I don't know how this looks during the day, but at almost 8:30 on a summer night, we had a lovely sunset ahead of us and views of the sides of the gorge on either side of the river.

 Finally, at 8:30, what I'd been waiting for came into view for the first time- Mount Hood. It looked fantastic with those colors on it. Later, we could almost see the snow on it. You can kind of see it in the zoom photo below.

We entered a big horseshoe bend as we approached The Dalles (rhymes with pals), a town with "the" in its name. There is a lock and dam here, which can be toured earlier in the day. We could see it, but it couldn't be photographed easily, as you can see from the light in these lovely photos from east of it.

Just west of the bend, you are in the Gorge proper. At 9:07 (43510), we stopped at Memaloose State Park rest area. This gave us a photo op, too, since it had a river view. I scraped my leg on a concrete bench, so appreciate these photos. We did some first aid in the restroom.

 

The moon was a welcome find. That second photo is looking west and the third is east. I can't say I've ever seen a winterized water fountain before.
We got back on the road again at 9:21.We passed the Cascade Locks, but couldn't really see them. Even though I knew it was really getting too dark for it, we soon got off of I-84 to go up to Multnomah Falls off of US 30. We arrived at the Lodge at 10:05 (43552) and I parked near the now closed shop. We got out and walked up the walkway to the lower viewing area. We could just make out the two levels of the falls. I took a photo that is not worth putting here.
We were there only a few minutes, which was a good thing, because a guy came out to yell at us and another car that we couldn't park there. The GPS had some trouble figuring out how to get us back to the interstate, but it eventually did.
J put in the address of the Fairfield she had booked for the night and the road continued along the river. We had a really tough time finding the place. Neither the GPS nor Google Maps really liked the address. It and a Marriott were back in an area full of apartments. We finally found it at 10:58. While she checked us in, I noted that the odometer now said 43582. I'd driven 661 miles today!
We were given room 237 and we hauled all our stuff up, as this was a two night stay. The room looked comfortable, but what did we really care at that hour? Our bodies thought that it was 11:58, when we arrived. We were in bed not long after 11:30. Tomorrow-city driving.