Tuesday, June 26, 2012

GOODBYE RAIN…HELLO SUNSHINE. SPOKANE, WA

Sunday, June 24 – A fitting “good-bye” from the Pacific Coast this morning when we pulled-out of the Bremerton Elks Lodge – It was raining and continued to pour until we topped the Snoqualmie Pass of the Cascade Mountains. Once over the mountains, the sun came out and it was a nice day with puffy white clouds.

raining

mountains

Boy is Eastern Washington different than the West Coast. This is agriculture country.

landscape in eastern washington

A particular nice farming area had signs all along I-90 telling you what crops were growing in the roadside fields. And they were irrigating the fields. Too bad the coast couldn't share some of that rain with these folks.

sign

potatoes sign

We were also surprised when we crossed over the Columbia River. It's dug a pretty impressive gorge here in the East, as well. Can't help of thinking about Lewis & Clark rowing down this river and the amazing sights they saw. It's so beautiful today, what was it like back then?

bridge ahead

Our destination today was Spokane, Washington. A longer drive than we like (six hours) but there aren't many stopping points between Seattle and Spokane. Oh, by the way, it's pronounced – Spo-Can, not Spo-cane.

Spokane

We are staying at another Elks Lodge – The Spokane Lodge on the eastside of the city. It is a very nice stop-over. Easy in and easy out from I-90. The cost is $15 for 50 amp electric and water. There is a dump station here at the campground. We are in site #17. There are 20 sites here at the Lodge. We have good satellite connection with our roof mounted Direct TV dish and good Verizon phone & Internet connections.

Plenty of room.
site 17

site 17

Rear view.
from the back

Looking left.
looking left

Looking right.
looking right

There is plenty of nearby shopping and being on the eastside of the city makes for an easy getaway when we leave, missing rush hour traffic.

Some places wrestle with chipmunks, some with ground hogs, here….marmots.
marmot

Unfortunately, the Lodge is closed on Sunday and Monday so we can't report on the activity at the Elks Lodge. The hosts in the campground are very friendly and met us as we pulled-in. The campground is nearly full tonight with only two or three open sites. Lucky for us, the site next to us is open giving us a nice lawn to relax on and enjoy the beautiful weather here in Eastern Washington. Bella loves that grass!

We had a lovely sky tonight. We hope to catch the sunset tomorrow night.
sky at night

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all back real soon. Have a great day!