JULY 2002

When we left Condon on the 1st, we were planning on staying at the Wildhorse Gaming Resort and Casino east of Pendleton since we had information that they had free RV parking. However, when we got there we discovered that the casino had put in an RV park and no longer allowed overnight parking in their parking lot. Therefore, we drove back to Pendleton and spent the night at the Elks Club.

On Tuesday morning, we left Pendleton and drove the 54 miles to the Rendezvous RV Resort in La Grande where we spent the 4th of July weekend. While there, we did grocery shopping, filled up the truck with diesel, and ate lunch out at a couple of local restaurants. We also took a trip down to the National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center northeast of Baker City. It is a very interesting museum and you can even see part of the Oregon Trail...I was surprised at how clear the tracks were after all these years.

Covered wagon:

The Oregon Trail:











Quilt at the Oregon Trail Center:











On the 7th, we drove 65 miles to Enterprise where we stayed overnight at the Elks Club and had dinner at one of the local restaurants, Plush West. The road from La Grande to Enterprise, SR-82, is my favorite type of road (not!)...a mountain road with a steep drop off on one side and no guard rails. Fortunately for most of the trip, we were on the inside. The views were spectacular, though...when I had my eyes open!

Originally, we were going to spend a couple of days at the Elks Club in Enterprise, but we found that they weren't really set up for RV parking, so on Monday we drove a whole 5 miles to the Mountain View RV Park in Joseph. Joseph is in a beautiful location at the foot of the Wallowa Mountains with Wallowa Lake and the Eagle Cap Wilderness nearby.

Wallowa Mountains:

Wallowa Lake:











The main industry in Joseph, other than tourism, are bronze foundries and artist galleries specializing in bronze sculptures. In fact, the downtown area has many large bronze sculptures on what seemed like each corner. We toured the Manuel Museum where we saw quite a few bronze sculptures and a history of the area. We also stopped at the Chief Joseph Cemetery Historical Monument, the burial place of the great Nez Perce leader of the 1870s.

Chief Joseph grave site:











On the 10th, we drove 126 miles to Moscow, Idaho, where we stayed at the Latah County Fairgrounds. From Joseph, we drove north on SR-3, stopping at the Joseph Canyon Viewpoint where we could look down into the canyon where the Nez Perce spent the winters. North of this point, just before entering into Washington, and then again after we crossed over the Grande Ronde River, the road hugged the side of the mountains with a steep drop off on one side. This time, we were on the outside much of the way.

Joseph Canyon:











The next day we drove 90 miles to the Elks Club in Spokane where we spent two weeks visiting friends. We had dinner a couple of times with our good friends, Mary and George, as well as Don and Emily. Earl got to golf a couple of times at Liberty Lake and we went out to lunch once at Dewey's East and once at Applebee's and had dinner on Earl's birthday at Tony Romas. Earl had the tires on the truck rotated and balanced, we did laundry a couple of times (had to do it at a laundromat since we didn't have sewer hookups at the Elks Club), and did shopping at Costco. We also had the opportunity to meet a couple, Tom and Mary, who live in Spokane, are Escapees and also Boomers (a "Birds of a Feather" group within the Escapees). We met for dinner and a movie..."Road to Perdition" with Tom Hanks. A great movie! We can highly recommend it.

On the 25th, we left Spokane and drove 223 miles to Lake Easton RV Resort in Easton where we spent the night. The next day, we drove into Woodinville to stay at Buck and Phyllis' place. Since we were there the last time in 2000, Buck had put in water and electrical hookups for two RVs. John and DeAnne had already arrived in their RV...we referred to Buck and Phyllis' place as "Hilltop RV." Earl didn't want to attend the formal reunion on Saturday night, so we had dinner at Thai Woodinville while everyone else was at the reunion. We did, however, attend the picnic the following day...a good time was had by all. Earl had a chance to golf a couple of times...once in Everett and once in Snohomish. We also went out to eat with "the group" (including Buck, Phyllis, John, DeAnne, and others who hang out together from Earl's high school graduating class). for several days in a row, there were balloons which floated over where we were parked. Often, we could hear the sound of the burners before the balloons floated into view from behind the trees.

Bridge over Columbia River at Vantage:

Our rig at "Hilltop RV:"











Balloon flying over "Hilltop RV:"