A Capital Moved, Spiders & Disney (Clarkston, WA & Lewiston, ID)

We said our goodbyes to Mom & Dad and Bridget & Richard. Today our Travel Day was from Missoula, MT, to Clarkston, WA. We stopped at Loves for fuel and breakfast at the adjoining Hardee’s. We knew it would be a long travel day with not a lot of towns around. We drove up the same Hwy 12 that we did yesterday through Bitterroot Mountains. This is the way Lewis & Clark and Corp of Discovery came. Actually, Hwy 12 goes right to our campground. HA We were about an hour early for check in time, now on Pacific time zone, so we stopped for groceries for the week.

Our campground is a literal island in the Snake River and is called Chief Timothy State Park campground. There are huge spiders and webs literally everywhere. Even in the water faucet. Kevin got a broom out and cleared off some. I think more webs than in Texas, if that is even possible. Crazy. Don’t like that. He said the bodies of the spiders are at least 2 inches long and a lot are even longer than that. There are trees out our door, dried grass, and the river is out the kitchen side but too many bushes to see it. This is a Corps of Engineers campground but ran by someone else. The area is extremely dry. The wild grasses are yellow, big smooth hills, and very little in the way of any trees.

It all started with a sign. Not American Sign Language, but a billboard. We saw in Clarkston a sign for Taco Time. This is from Utah and my brother’s favorite taco place. Oh, I wonder if Costa Vida Mexican Grill is around here. (My most favorite place to eat.) I see, no, not here, but 2 1/2 hours west of us in Richland area.! We need to go. 😉 While looking it up on the map, I see Sacajawea State Park Interpretive Center in Pasco, WA, just outside of Richland area. How did I miss that one in planning? Well, we could leave here a day early and go there on Saturday, see the visitor center, eat at Costa Vida, and plus, be 2 1/2 hours closer to our next campground. Otherwise, the travel day on that Sunday is over 7 hours. I had asked Kevin about that long drive awhile ago and he was okay with it. I didn’t know how much there was to see and do around here. Turns out…we will be done with Lewis & Clark and Nez Perce stuff in 1 day! Well, I thought, my brain continuing to come up with ideas, what time is check in around Pasco? If it is late, that wouldn’t give us time at the visitor center. How about we go after work on Friday – that is the start of the Labor Day weekend so I am sure everyone will be off work early. Right?! Found Franklin County RV Park and saw they had 3 sites open. We booked one. It all started with a billboard for Taco Time. LOL

Lewiston Public Library, Lewiston, ID 08/26

It was very hot with heat warnings yesterday, today, and tomorrow (over 103°). We went to the Lewiston, ID, public library. It is a neat old building that was built in 1896. It used to be three different stores, including hardware store. I could feel the floor creak as people walked around. Today Dolly Parton died. I saw a lot of books out about her so the librarians must have set them out for today. I looked through a book she wrote with one of her sisters that is a cookbook. Sweet. I have most of the recipes already. HA One spider inside HOWE (footnote 1) today and a web. Eck!

I worked on Exploring Cards for the end of the Lewis & Clark trail in a few weeks. We are both quite sad about being almost done with it. Surprising to both of us but strong feelings, yes. We have been to all the places there around Astoria and over in Washington back in 2023 but we want to do them again and finish up the Corps of Discovery journey. Back home (footnote 2) Kevin actually sat outside for a long while. He said with all the huge spiders, they keep the bugs away. HAHA True…but… HA.

(The next day:) I am not saying this out loud because I don’t want to jinx it, but so far, we have only found 1 spider and web inside HOWE. Oh my gosh, I have never seen so many huge spiders and webs in my life! Kevin and I make grand gestures whenever we go outside waving hands and arms in every direction to try to clear webs. He, leading the way, with arms stretched out in front of him and me, following in his every step so as to avoid webs. Yuck and Eck! 

My 1st Making Focaccia Bread, Photo After Having A Few Bites, Clarkston, ID 08/26

Sourdough Starter: Today I made Focaccia from Charlene Yoder’s Everything Sourdough. It is very sloppy and sticky dough, as per the directions, and I had my doubts. Letting it rise for 6-12 hours, it took about 9 hours to double. That was weird because it was so hot in that corner of the counter. Plopped the dough in olive oil and the cookie sheet, let it rise 1 1/2 hours and then baked. What a surprise – it was outstanding! Tasted just like the bread at Macaroni Grill! I didn’t add any extra stuff to it (normally garlic, tomatoes, cheese, herbs, etc) because I wanted to get the taste of the bread. Dipped it in olive oil and it was hard to only eat a small piece! I could eat this every day.

Clearwater Joins Snake River, Lewiston, ID / Clarkston, WA 08/26

After work we drove to where Clearwater and Snake Rivers meet. There is a tiny parking lot, a walk way over Levee Bypass to a Lewis & Clark outside pavilion with signs. One sign says it was over 4000 miles from St Louis to the Pacific Ocean. What takes 4 days to drive, 4 hours to fly, took over 500 days for Corps of Discovery. We saw a few boats on the water and a cruise ship. We think it would be great fun to take that ship from Lewiston to the ocean.

Next we drove to Oceanview Park which is along the Clearwater River. We got out our chairs – Kevin brushed them off at home from all the spiders and webs – and I grabbed our picnic dinner. This entire area around and in these two twin towns have dry tall grasses. This park, however, is green grass and some trees. We set up right near the water. First we read our books for awhile. A dad and a young son came over and asked if they could fish in front of us. Of course and good luck. Soon a toddler boy came and a mom and baby. Later the mom and baby left; she told us “someone has to make dinner.” HAHA We had Unusual Cottage Cheese Salad, Cajun sausage, pepper jack cheese, and crackers. Yummy. We saw quite a few ski-dos on the river plus a lot of tour boats and they were full. Some people were water skiing and some boats just out for fast fun. The weather was very comfortable here.

Ah Politics! Lewiston, ID 08/26

Nez Perce County Historical Society and Museum in Lewiston, ID, opened at 10:00 a.m. so we slept in. This is a great museum. Without us even asking, two ladies worked over 45 minutes to get a TV captioned. (I am deaf so need the words on this screen.) They even switched out TVs and made it work. My heart was overwhelmed with their kindness and caring and their making sure I could have full access and experience. Even as I said they didn’t have to keep trying because I was thankful for their efforts, they kept working at it until it worked. This place get the top A+! This place will get a great letter! Walt Disney’s wife grew up around here and they were married here in Lewiston. There is quite the history of where the capital of Idaho being here in Lewiston and then being “stolen” and voting illegal and moved to Boise. Lincoln had appointed his friend Wallace as the governor of the territory but then replaced him a year ago. William Wallace and his wife turned down the invitation of Abraham and Mary to go to Ford’s Theater on that fateful night. We thought this museum was laid out very nicely and gave us great information. 

Next we drove to Lewis & Clark Discovery Center which is in Hells Gate State Park. This is another great center from the Lewis & Clark Foundation. Immediately the lady told us about the films and said that 2 of the 3 are captioned. Thanks. We always like to see the films first. The chief interpreter for Lewis & Clark with the Native Americans was George Drouillard. His dad was French Canadian and his mom was Shawnee. He understood Indian customs, was an expert in Indian Sign Language and was fluent in 2 Indian languages. In fact, when Lewis & Clark and guys went looking for Sacagawea’s Shoshone tribe, they didn’t even take her with them over several days. She didn’t go with them until plans and tradings had already happened. The signs continue that she was a guide only in the areas which she grew up. She did help by being a friendly token to tribes they met. For dinner, we drove around and found Sharp’s Drive In. It is exactly like Arctic Circle in Utah. Delicious burgers, fry sauce, and I had a huckleberry shake. Rated: So good! We Will Be Back.

Snake River, Clarkston, WA 08/26

*The blog posts are taken from my daily travel journal. Would you believe – it takes me a 1/2 day every week to whittle down a week’s worth of journal so it won’t be too long for the post each week. HAHA Thank you for reading!

1. “HOWE” is what we named our Alliance Avenue 36-ft 5th wheel. See: Home On WhEels and we pronounce it Howie. We live and travel in it full-time around the country. HOWE has stayed at least one night in all 48 continuous U.S. states.

2. “Home” is where we park it. Home is our 2022 Alliance Avenue, 36 ft, 5th wheel.