Little Things

 Our porch up, and our awning out. Now it feels like home!

 (Click to enlarge any of these photos.)

 A walk on a forest trail on a sunny afternoon.

 Soft, delicate, spring wildflowers, some kind of clover.

 Turtles catching some rays, active even amidst the flooding debris.

The pavilion in the tenting area — beautiful reflection, though it means no tent camping till flood waters recede!

A Daring Deed!

 Our anxiously awaited first opportunity to visit the family in Wenatchee finally came. The weather was perfect, and we had 2 days to see the kids and the Valley after a year away. This is Saddle Rock, probably the most notable landmark in the Wenatchee Valley, and seen at the most beautiful time of year, spring-time!

 We've been so excited for our 10 year old granddaughter ever since we learned she had joined the Wenatchee Youth Circus. It's doubtful we can attend an actual performance because of our work schedule, but we did get to go to the practice. There is Natalie, up 30 feet in the air, walking the tight wire for her 3rd or 4th time! We held our collective breaths, amazed at what we were seeing! She showed no fear, did not waver, and made it safely from one end to the other.
(Click to enlarge for a better look.)

 This looked even scarier! The two young men above are seasoned walkers, and had coached Natalie well. Her life was in their hands, and on their shoulders!

 Ta Dah! Half-way there! And they made it!

 http://wenatcheeyouthcircus.com/

 Back down to earth, here is Grannie admiring one of daughter Betsy's backyard chickens.

 And daughter Jessi, with her best friend's son Jakey.

Katy, 13, wouldn't pose for us, so this is the best I could do. She and mom are checking out the camera. I tried to get my son in a photo but that didn't work out. We got to enjoy the whole family at dinnertime, a yummy hotdog barbecue on Betsy's newly decorated patio. We had a wonderful visit with our family in Wenatchee, hopefully to be repeated a few more times this summer.

Hey, Ma! Look at this!

 It's been raining so much here in north Idaho, Mr. Keith decided to put the awning out so we could keep dry when we open our door. He went around back to take the step ladder off where we have it bungie-corded to our RV ladder. This is what he found! Hey, Ma! Look at this! He very carefully put it back so Mama Robin could sit on her eggs once again. It looks like the nest has a nice roof over it to protect it from the rain.

 Our 5th wheel sits right up against the forest in the back of our space. Mama Robin must have thought this looked like the ideal sheltered place to set up housekeeping and baby raising. We had no idea what was going on out there! I'll be sneaking around the back occasionally to have a peek. I imagine we'll be able to hear the peeping from inside if we listen carefully.

On a more serious note — Lake Coeur d'Alene is predicted to rise about 5 feet or more above its normal level, and has already risen half that. This is the view from our campground office, looking down on the tent sites. (Click to enlarge.) The water has covered more than half the sites and will reach nearly to the road that you can see in the photo, just beyond the flower boxes. We're told that doesn't happen very often. The last time was 2008. It's that rain, combined with warmer days melting the snow in the mountains too quickly for it to be absorbed. We look at the geese and ducks swimming around down there, some with babies. They at least are having a good time!

Cataldo Mission

After a week of hard work, we had a beautiful, sunny day to go sight-seeing. My first choice was the Cataldo Mission State Park. If you know Mr. Keith, he likes to go anywhere using back roads. Before we drove into the Mission, which is the oldest building in Idaho, we explored the very small town of Cataldo, and found this lovely photo opportunity up a gravel road. This is a Mennonite Church, reflected beautifully in a pond made by the overflow of the Coeur d'Alene River.

I first visited this site many years ago and have always been fascinated by its story.

In the early part of the 19th century, Coeur d'Alene Indians heard of a neighboring tribe who had powerful medicine men in black robes. Wanting this power themselves, they traveled the long journey east to St. Louis, inviting the "black robes" (Jesuit priests) to live among them. Father DeSmet, and soon Father Ravalli, came and established the mission with the help of the Indians, who did the labor to construct the mission, from 1850-1853. Many became Christians and lived at this site for years. I've always been amazed at how these two priests got around! Many places in Montana also bear their names, for instance, St. Mary's Mission in Stevensville, Montana, the oldest building in Montana, and St. Ignacius Mission on the road to Glacier Park.

The complex sits on a hill right above the Coeur d'Alene River and is beautifully landscaped and preserved. The Parrish House, to the left, has also been restored and is fun to tour. The history of the association and co-operation between the Indians and the Jesuit priests is fascinating. There were no wars fought here!

Father Ravalli must have been a genius, multi-talented and vastly educated. He designed and supervised the building, hand-carved the altar and much of the furnishings, and even painted the art-work. "The Mission of the Sacred Heart was constructed using a technique called "wattle and daub" which involved using large hand-hewn logs latticed with saplings, woven with grass and caked with mud. The resulting walls are up to a foot thick and built without a single nail. The limited materials were used ingeniously to decorate the church. The walls were covered with fabric and painted newspaper, creating the illusion of wallpaper. The main wooden altar was painted to resemble marble; tin cans were shaped to create chandeliers. The blue color of the interior wood is not paint, but a stain made of huckleberries."

Beautiful and amazing!

 

As we stood at the back of the mission complex and looked over the hill we were treated to this lovely picture, the swollen Coeur d'Alene River surrounded by trees just beginning to leaf out, with the snow covered hills in the background. There were wildflowers popping out all over, a warm breeze, sunshine, and a great feeling of God's presence in this place!

The Lake

 Since we've arrived at the camping resort near Coeur d'Alene where we are working for the summer, it's been mostly cloudy and cool. We're anxiously awaiting days of sunshine! Mr. Keith has managed to find many back roads already, and we've done some exploring in our off hours. Here is a photo of the lake taken from a beach near the main part of town.

That is I-90 up there in the sky above the bay! We've been intrigued by how the freeway has been suspended in this particular stretch, named the "Veterans Memorial Centennial Highway". I believe the old highway followed the lake shore as far as it could, and the freeway still does most of the time. The roadway where we took this photo is part of the old highway, but it ends abruptly a little way from here. There is a great hiking path along the road, which borders the old Yellowstone Trail and the Mullan Road.

I love this photo! We took BigTruk out for a spin to make sure everything was working okay after his major surgery (new transmission). Mr. Keith snapped this photo showing the winding road we'd just traveled in our search for a good view of the high section of freeway that we had wanted to photograph. There will soon, we hope, be a day with sunshine and we will get some good pictures of beautiful Lake Coeur d'Alene and the forested area that surrounds it.

Missoula to Coeur d'Alene

We have completed the final leg of our trip to Coeur d'Alene. Since the Missoula KOA is one of our favorite places to stay, and to work, I've included a photo of our rig there. It's a lovely park, with big, old pines and firs and willows. We enjoyed greeting the employees with whom we've worked and also enjoyed some meals with various ones during our 3 night stay there. But, as it always does, the time to move on arrived, and we said our good-byes.

The weather reports said there would be snow on Lookout Pass, and there was indeed snow, but none on the road. About 100 miles from Missoula we crossed over the pass, headed down and saw the 'Welcome to Idaho' sign just below the summit. Yay! We're almost there!

This is our spot at the Lake Coeur d'Alene Camping Resort. It's one of the largest, yet it took 3 men quite a bit of maneuvering to get our big rig into. We're used to pull-thrus! In the process, just about when we thought we had it right, BigTruk gave up the ghost and shed red fluid all over, a real tragedy for us. We felt like crying! 

Fortunately, we have emergency road service so the next morning we called them and they sent out this tow truck to haul BigTruk to the Ford garage in Coeur d'Alene. In a few hours we had the verdict. BigTruk needs an organ transplant, a rebuilt transmission for only $4500! We are devastated, but we must do what we must do or we won't be going anywhere! God is good to take care of us no matter what happens. We've seen that over and over!

The owners here are so nice. We know we are going to love working with them. The park is still closed for a couple more days and we are the only rig here. It feels kind of lonely, but that will change soon!

This is the view of the eastern end of Lake Coeur d'Alene from the entrance to our campground. It's been a cloudy, darkish day but you can still see the beauty that we will be looking at on a daily basis. Mr. Keith and I are very thankful for what we have, our health, the great people we get to meet, the memories we're building, and the adventures we are able to have.

Rapid City to Missoula

 

I did not take any photos on our trip from Rapid City to Sheridan because the weather was so bad it took all my energy to keep vigilant on the road. We experienced heavy wind, rain, snow and mud almost all the way. Mr. Keith did well with the 5th wheel. The horizon was in a fog so we missed the lovely scenery we know is throughout Wyoming. We could imagine it, though, as we've been this way many times! In due time we arrived in Sheridan Wyoming. By then the sun was out a little, but it was freezing cold and still blowing furiously. We did have a pretty spot to park at the Sheridan KOA. We had never stopped there before.

The next day was gorgeous, all trace of wind gone. We were so happy about that because we've found that in a heavy wind BigTruk gets about 6 miles per gallon, while in good conditions it gets close to 10. Diesel is always the biggest part of our traveling expense. The most we paid was $4.14 a gallon and BigTruk holds 72 gallons. You can imagine the cost of a fill-up! This view is of the Crazy Mts. in Montana, close to Bozeman. Stunning! I wonder why they are called 'Crazy'. They didn't look all that much different from the other mountain ranges surrounding us.

There is a long trek through very high, rocky mountains to the east of Butte. I say 'rocky' because the rock formations through this region are amazing. Here we are coming down out of the mountains into Butte.

 

Here is one last photo before we got to Missoula, We're near the cut-off to Anaconda. It's still a beautiful day. We arrived at the Missoula KOA about 1:00 and were greeted by several of the employees with whom we worked for the last 2 summers. Hugs were exchanged! It was almost like coming home! We set up in 60 degree sunshine and actually sweated a little, in contrast to freezing the previous 2 nights. We will be here for 3 or 4 nights, waiting for our campground in Coeur d'Alene to have water turned on and a site readied for us. The last leg of our journey will be short, about 170 miles, and then we'll be settled in for the next 4 months. It's a fantastic life-style!