Monday, April 29
We're on the road again. Sometimes it felt like today would never get here. Other times it felt like today was upon us before we were ready for it. In any event, now we are traveling again. It will be real interesting to see how we do with the dog. After one day, she has done really well, but that is only one day.
We didn't get away quite as early as I might have thought – we didn't finally get on the road
until a little after 11:00. Despite that, we got as far as Spokane before we decided to call
it a day. We could have gone further, but Linda wants to do a
Volkswalk.
in Coeur d'Alene tomorrow, so we set up camp.
The one major mistake that I have appeared to make so far is that I forgot the cable that I need to download pictures off my camera. The advantage to having somebody living in our house is that I could call her and have her mail them to me at my cousin's house. If I can get by taking fewer than 45 pictures (that are worth keeping) before I get to Wisconsin, I will be in business.
Tuesday, April 30
Last night was most uncomfortable. For the year that we have had Lili, we have been sleeping in a king-sized bed. Despite our best intensions – Lili was not going to sleep on the bed with us, but on the floor or in a chair in the bedroom – it took her about a week to not only wind up sleeping on our bed, but right between us. This isn't terribly bad on a large bed, but now we had to transpose that onto a bed in the van that is only 40 inches wide. Last night wasn't real cold, but when there is a dog in the middle of that bed we wind up with very little room, and she pulls the covers into the middle, leaving the outside edges of the sleeping area exposed. In the wee hours of the morning, we finally got a little bit smart, and encouraged her to sleep under the covers. This had the effect of having her taking up less of the space, keeping us warm with her nice warm body, and allowing us all to get a better nights sleep. This is all well and good here – it will only be later that we will be able to find out what kind of a monster we have created with this behavior.
After a very poor night's sleep, we woke up to very bright, clear air. I was eager to get east
as soon as possible, but Linda wanted to slow down and smell the roses. She wanted to do a
Volkswalk in Coeur d'Alene. She convinced me that we should do the walk, and I am glad she
did. For most of the walk, the temperature was in the low 60's, and it was sunny. We got
some spectacular views of the lake from a loop around Tubbs Hill.
Just before we finished the walk, it clouded up and started to sprinkle. The rest of the day
was wet, and it started to get cold. By the time we got to Butte, where we spent the night,
it had gotten cold enough so that it was starting to spit some snow. We thought about
trying to find a motel room, but we eventually decided that we have learned enough to be
reasonably comfortable in the van. After all, we do have Lili to help keep us warm.
Wednesday, May 1
When we were packing for this trip, we tried to pack lighter than we did on our previous
road trip. Whenever we had doubts about whether or not to include an item, we used, as
one of our considerations, the mantra "We're not going to Outer Mongolia. Well, today we
drove through Outer Mongolia. We drove much further than we probably should have on any
one day (probably about 600 to 650 miles, I think), but that was in part due to the fact
that, when we decided that we would pick up a few groceries, get gas, and spend the night,
we couldn't find anything.
We were in the quaint little town of Medora, North Dakota – the gateway to Theodore
Roosevelt National Park, and it was as though we were in a time warp. Getting into town at
about 5:30, we discovered that the only store that looked like it would pass for either a gas
station or a grocery store was a mom and pop outfit that had hours of 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM.
As pretty as the town was, it looked like we had gone into some kind of a time warp, and the
streets were deserted. It is a very small town, so it didn't take long to check out all of the
streets, and we couldn't find anything that appeared to be open. Linda finally found
somebody she could ask (we had kind of separated, each looking for some source of food),
and they pointed out a bar that they thought was open and serving dinner. After walking
around it, looking for an open door, we decided that it really wasn't open after all. When we
were getting back into the car, the proprietor (who was also the bar tender, the cook, the
waitress, the bus girl, and the dishwasher), came out and asked us if we were looking for
someplace to eat. As a result, we did go in and had a pretty good fish 'n chips dinner. As a
result, we decided to continue on to Bismarck, and see if we could get a room.
The weather has been cold all day. We don't have a thermometer with us, so I don't know
exactly how cold, but I would venture a guess that it never got above the mid 40's. During
most of the day it was very windy (as you might guess for the great plains), and during most
of the morning hours there was spitting snow and sleet.
During the last part of today's trip, Lili was very restless. She did not appear to be at all
happy with the idea of riding in the car. After taking her for a short walk in Medora, she
was, for the first time, very balky about getting back into the car. In the car she kept
acting like she wanted to get out. She exhibited this same kind of behavior during the last
part of yesterday's trip. We are hopeful that she is just bored, and that once we stop
driving like mad men and start making stops and doing walks, she will be less bored and
easier to get along with. She never exhibited this behavior last November when we drove
to Washington, DC and back for Thanksgiving dinner.
As far as our sleeping in the car, I think that we have gotten some of the kinks out of that.
Last night was quite cold, but by using both the blanket that we brought for warm nights
and the sleeping bag that we brought for cold nights, we were warm enough. By encouraging
Lili to get under the covers with us, we found that she no longer tended to pull the covers
off of us, and it made the narrow bed feel a little roomier. We will hope that this will
continue.
