Idaho-o-o-o-o-o!
Well, we’ve been sociable with hundreds of people in our B&B since we opened last Oct. We’ve made countless hours of conversation with people that we hardly knew, and, although we have enjoyed every minute of it, we decided that it was time to spend a weekend on our own in a different town with no phone, and no appointments.
So it was that we found ourselves blazing through Cranbrook at the end of last week on our way to the American border. We’d not been into the US that way, so this was going to be a serious trip. I think I’m getting used to Homeland Security because after the “are you bringing in anything to sell?” no, “are you bringing in alcohol? “no”, are you bringing in firearms? “no”, I asked her where the best place to eat in Coeur d’Alene might be. I think it threw her to be honest, but she recommended Chilis (nope) or The Texas Roadhouse. More of that later.
Hungry, and you’d have to be, we stopped at the Subway attached to a Conoco garage where we met a “lovely young man” – a sandwich artist no less – who put together my sarnie. Missing his front teeth, he asked where in Oz we were from (a theme throughout our stay), and told us that he’d been to Canada himself. Apparently he’d spent a night in the cells there. He’d done the same in California and explained that Canadian cells were much nicer than American ones were.
On our way again, we finally arrived in town early in the evening, and were surprised to find that (and I can’t believe this is true, they must have moved the hotel), contrary to Cath’s recollection, the hotel wasn’t on the edge of the lake in beautiful gardens, but in the Shop Co carpark. The downside was that there wasn’t a lot of grass, but on the other hand, there was no shortage of parking. The hotel room was amazing, and more than made up for the location. A huge four poster bed settled into one half of the room, while a huge jacuzzi was in the other. We barely had to roll out of bed before we were able to soak against massaging jets. Nice one Cath!
Coeur d’Alene was nice enough, but the lake didn’t really float our boats, so on the Saturday we headed over to Spokane to have a look around. People keep telling us about the amazing shopping, but we aren’t really big shoppers. The city itself (the largest one between Seattle and St. Pauls Minneapolis) was beautiful, and well worth staying in next time we are in the area. There is a large set of falls there that are absolutely amazing. Unfortunately, the waiter at the Clinkerdagger (a fantastic name for a restaurant) told us that the river had been turned off for the day. Turned off?? Those cheeky Americans and their river damming projects! Oh well, the dry river-bed was slightly interesting, but nowhere near as interesting as my crab sandwich – mmmm.
Saturday, and we pretty much stayed in bed all day. The only exception was to find out about this Texas Roadhouse. It was great. If you are ever in Coeur d’Alene you must go there. It certainly isn’t bistro food I can tell you, but what it was, was Texan comfort food. Cath downed half a rack of (don’t give me no steenking veg) ribs, and I had the Country Fried Chicken. When she asked which type of gravy I’d like I must have given her a blank look because she suddenly started explaining about each type of gravy. Well the food was great, and the staff (semi-) spontaneously breaking out into a line dancing routine really made the whole experience very surreal!
Our journey home was about 8 hours and took in a number of towns and two states on the way. We drove across northern Idaho, through Wallace (an amazing town on the highway. Apparently the govt wanted to bulldoze the town to make room for an upgraded highway, but the canny burghers managed to get the whole of the downtown listed before work started. Consequently the highway now runs over the top of the buildings on a viaduct. A few hundred miles later and we found ourselves in Paradise – Paradise, Montana that is. A small town of 184 inhabitants and only a couple of streets, it was a case of blink and it’s gone. Mind you, while you were blinking, there was every chance you would have caught sight of some happy clappers marching along the side of the highway. This was Sunday after all.
The road failed to twist and turn for a good many miles as we chewed up the ground underneath our wheels. Considering the heat and forecast “abundance of sunshine”, we’d have given for a dip in the river. We had to keep driving though, otherwise we’d have been incredibly late getting into Fernie. As it was, after a brief look on main street Libby (unfortunately not a place to very go back to), where the most interesting store was “Shoes and Socks etc”, and where murals of bald eagles broke up the walls, we drove on to Libby Dam; the reason for the Lake Koocanusa that straddles the US/Canadian border. An impressive structure, it was shocking to see something so big in the middle of nowhere after driving through so many small towns. Anyway, within an hour we were back over the border and on the final leg to Fernie.
We had a great weekend, and are now ready for our trip back to the old country. See you all soon.
Well I think you all know by now, but Cath decided on a new Half Ironman distance to see if a) she could do it, b) if she could do it without having asthma problems and c) I would be able to sit around for twice the amount of time as a supporter waiting for her to flash by on each leg of her journey to the finishing line. If you haven’t heard about this, then the write-up is 
