A Day of Rest and Recovery

When we got up this morning, we were both pretty stiff and sore from getting bucked off the ATV yesterday.  My left wrist had the least amount of cuts and I didn’t think it caught so much of the fall, but it was hurting quite a bit by the end of the day yesterday and had a lot of swelling in it today.  I had ice packs on it for much of the day and there seems to be some improvement tonight.  Other than a couple of things we had to pick up in town, we just hung out at the RV today getting some rest.

This evening Lee and Barb joined us for happy hour and we barbecued some salmon and had some potato salad to go along with it.  It turned out pretty good.  After dinner, we just sat out in the adjoining camp sight with our after dinner drinks and talking about our past travels and future plans.

Before going back to our RV’s for the remainder of the evening, the full moon made it’s appearance.

Tomorrow we’ll be driving to visit our friends Bruce and Nena who purchased some property near Plains, MT last summer.  They’ve been busy having a septic system installed and doing other work on their property and we’re looking forward to seeing them.

A Very Short ATV Ride in Montana

After breakfast this morning, I got busy and packed the lunch for our ATV ride with Lee and Barb.  After Ken got going, he was outside getting the ATV ready to unload from the truck and preparing it for our ride.  We finally hit the road around 11am and headed west through the town of St Regis on the route Barb had planned for the day.  After a few miles, we turned on the dirt road following alongside the St Regis River.  Lee and Barb were leading the way and we stayed back some due to the dust.  We got about 3 miles down the road when Ken had been looking at the hillside and apparently hit a rock with the right side of the ATV that threw us off it.  Ken has a scraped up head, arm, and knee and I landed pretty much on my hands and right hip and have some badly scraped up knuckles.  Lee and Barb came back to check on us and after a brief rest and putting some water on our bloody parts, we were able to ride back to the campground where we rested for the remainder of the day.  My right hand looks the worst, but my left hand has been getting progressively worse during the day.  We’ll see how things are looking in the morning to determine whether we need medical follow up or not.  So much for the ATV ride photos.

That’s it until my next update.

Spokane, WA to St Regis, MT

Over the last few days, we’ve been finishing things up in Spokane and getting ready to do some traveling again.  That included trips back to Costco to have some adjustments made to Ken’s hearing aids and to Walmart to stock up on items not available in smaller towns.  We invited our daughter Laura and our son-in-law Bob to the Elks for a visit and to attend their Saturday night $5 dinner and had a good time with them.

He headed east around 10:30am on Sunday morning and had two mountain passes to drive over…the first one is the 4th of July Pass.  In my working years, I drove this pass daily from our home in Cataldo, Idaho to work in Coeur d’Alene.  This next photo brings back some sad memories as it was the location of a tragic event for the Groene family in 2005.

We’re at the summit of the 4th of July Pass and driving down into the Silver Valley.

Our second mountain pass of the day was Lookout at the border of Montana and Idaho.

There is a rest area about 4 miles east of the pass in Montana where we thought we would have a lunch break.  That did not happen as there were several oversize trucks parked there blocking the RV/truck parking entrance.  We continued on for another 29 miles or so to our exit at St Regis and this is our site in the Nugget Campground in St Regis.

We later spent the evening with our friends Lee and Barb in their site at the other end of the park for happy hour and dinner.  We made plans for an ATV ride on Monday, and returned to the RV for the remainder of the evening.

Our ATV ride for Monday will begin around 11am and we plan to pack our lunch and camera and hopefully I’ll be getting some better photos for the blog updates.  Until then…

Not Much Going On Today

Once again…no pictures today.  We took some 2x4’s to Ken’s brother’s house that we didn’t need anymore.  We had used them for moving the refrigerator out to work on it earlier in our stay in Spokane.  After dropping off the 2x4’s, we all went to lunch at Laguna Café near Ron and Mary Ann’s house.

Ken still wasn’t happy with the way the new hearing aids were working, so we drove back to Costco to have the technician make some adjustments.  We had placed another ad on Craigslist for the chainsaw winch that we picked up at our hunting partner’s home the other day, and Ken received a call on that tonight.  The caller seemed very interested and we may receive another call from them tomorrow to make arrangements to meet…so we’ll see what happens there.

Tomorrow we’ll be packing things up and hoping to be on the road to MT in the next couple of days to meet friends for some ATV riding.

Can You Hear Me Now?

Ken received a call from Costco on Tuesday morning that they would be able to work him into an earlier appointment for picking up his new hearing aids.  We arrived a little before the 11:30am appointment and we ended up spending about an hour and a half there getting everything set up.  We have a favorite Chinese restaurant just a few block west of Costco, so that was our next stop.  One of the hearing aids didn’t seem to be working properly so after lunch, we headed back to Costco to look into a solution.  It was an easy fix and we were out of there.

Ken’s first project of the day on Wednesday was to work on the light post again.  He made some changes to the wiring, and when it got dark tonight, we’re happy to say the light is now working!

After the light project was completed and after lunch, we headed to Walmart so I could take advantage of a discount coupon for a haircut and we also picked up a few items at the store. 

We had an early dinner so Ken could attend the Elks lodge meeting this evening.

We’re planning on getting a few loose ends tied up around here so that we’ll be able to travel in the next few days.  We’re getting tired of sitting in one spot and the Elks has a big car show scheduled for the 5th of August.  The car show would probably be fun to see, but we’ve been told that visitors park in RV sites and take over the place, so we want to be out of here for that event.

More later…

Some Work, A Walk on the Centennial Trail, and New Glasses

Being a cooler day, we decided to complete the light post project at the Elks lodge.  Prior to this Ken and Gene had replaced the wiring inside of the pole, but when they went to put the globe back on over the light, something was broken and the globe wouldn’t stay in place.

The globe has now been secured, the light is working, and the pole is ready to be raised back into place.

The light pole has been raised and secured.

Ken is finishing up wiring in the electric eye for the light.  As I’m preparing this blog, it is now dark, and the light has not come on, so either the wiring needs to be changed or the electric eye is bad.

After lunch, we drove down to a parking area in the Maribeau area and took a walk on the Centennial Trail.  As we approached the railroad bridge, a train crossed it.

It’s a little small to see in this photo, but there’s a raft in the river under the bridge.

As we were returning to the truck, we received a call that Ken’s new glasses had arrived.  So after the walk, we drove to Costco to get the glasses.

When we were at Chuck and Phyllis’ house the other day, she gave me several starts for hen and chicks cactus to take to the house in Arizona City.  I don’t have a green thumb, so time will tell as to whether they will survive until we get there.  But, so far they look okay.

So far, the only thing planned for tomorrow is volunteering at taco Tuesday at the Elks lodge.  So until my next update…

Catching Up With the Blog

After reading Dennis & Carol's blog this morning where he mentioned following ours, I decided it was time to get it updated again as I’ve been ignoring it for the last couple of weeks.  We’re still at the Elks lodge in Spokane, WA.  Our daughter and her family lives in Nine Mile Falls and Ken’s brother is in Spokane, and when we had a house in Idaho it was about 60 miles east of here.  So, we find ourselves keeping very busy while here visiting with family, friends, and doctor visits.  Ken had an appointment at Costco on Friday, July 6th to have his hearing tested (huh?).  Due to the results of the exam, he was referred to Spokane ENT before getting fitted for hearing aids.

Our grandson Dominique’s school was hosting a basketball tournament on Saturday 7/7 which we attended.  His school team won the tournament!

Between games, we had lunch at the Zip’s drive-in across from the school.  Kayley (Demetrius’ girlfriend) and the other cheerleaders were holding a car wash, so we took advantage of that and had the truck cleaned up.

In our many drives out to our grandsons’ high school, we pass by the Spokane House (an old trading post) which is not usually open.  As we headed home, we saw that the gate was open and took a quick tour of their museum.

This is a replica of how Spokane House was laid out in the past.

Beaver fur was traded here.

We returned to Laura’s on Sunday for a barbecue dinner.

The week of July 9th was a week of doctor and RV repair visits.  Ken had an eye exam Monday morning and that afternoon went to Spokane ENT for an appointment there after which they scheduled him for a CT scan later in the week.

The part to repair our HWH leveling system in the RV finally arrived at RV’s Northwest and we drove there on Tuesday the 10th to get that back in working order.  We thought they were sending just a circuit board to fix the problem, but they sent the entire control box.  Back at the Elks, we are now able to dump the air and lower the jacks again to get level while parked.

Ken’s CT scan was on 7/12, and after running some errands, we went back to pick up a copy of the results.

Laura’s birthday was on the 15th, and we let her have the day with Bob and the boys since we had left her a gift the previous weekend.  That afternoon, we went to the home of Chuck and Phyllis along with Gene and Kathy (RV hosts here) to discuss a trip that Chuck and Phyllis are planning to TX.  Of course we all had good recommendations of places for them to see during their travels.

Tuesday was my birthday and we spent the day going to Spokane ENT for Ken to discuss the CT scan with his doctor.  He was cleared to go back to Costco to order his hearing aids.  We drove to Coeur d’Alene to order a part to reverse the door on our residential refrigerator, then back to Costco to set up an appointment for Ken to order the hearing aids.  We went to the sunset dinner at Anthony’s at Spokane Falls and it was very good!

Ken had a fitting for his hearing aids on the 18th, they were ordered, and he goes back next week to pick them up.

On the 19th, we headed to Prichard, ID to the home of our longtime hunting partners, Jim and Mary Lou.  We had a long visit with them and went to the Prichard Tavern for lunch.  Mary Lou along with her late husband Walt owned the Prichard Tavern for many years.  After lunch, Ken got everything he had stored in their shop along with our old snowmobile trailer.  We brought everything back to the Elks lodge with plans to sell the trailer.  I put an ad on Craigslist for the trailer Friday morning and Ken got a call about it on Friday evening.  That caller showed up on Saturday and bought it.

After the new owners of the trailer left, we joined Gene and Kathy and Ron and Sandy for a free lunch at R&R RV in the Spokane Valley.  After the pulled pork sandwiches, we all checked out some of the new 5th wheels and motorhomes on the lot.

Ron said this shower was just right!

Saturday evening, the six of us went up to the Elks for the dinner.

Sandy had to cool off with a bag of ice on her head.

Sunday was another hot day in Spokane.  After watching the NASCAR race, we drove to the Spokane Valley Mall to get in a little walk out of the heat.  And after this long catch up post, I’ll try to be a little better and post more often.

Vanilla Thunder Wins Their Bracket!!!!

July 1st was the final day for HoopFest and Dominique’s team was scheduled to play their first game at 9:30am.  We arrived a few minutes late, but that didn’t deter their team from winning that game.  All of the games are played on the same court, so we left our lawn chairs set up and shared them with the family of another team while we weren’t there.  Our lunch yesterday was pre-packaged and we decided to search out something better on Sunday.  We didn’t have far to walk when we found O’Doherty’s Irish Pub and Grill.  We were quickly seated and ordered reubens.  It was a fantastic meal and we would definitely go back if we’re in the downtown Spokane area again.

Dominique’s second game on Sunday was played at 1:00pm and once again, Vanilla Thunder ruled the court!  That left us with a 2.25 hour wait for the final game.

I think this photo will show how the final game turned out:

Congratulations to Dominique and his teammates on Vanilla Thunder!

After a long day watching the games on Sunday, it was back to our normal week of taking care of the usual.  Monday meant a visit to the doctor in Spokane to have a backup plans for our prescriptions when we’re on the road for several months at a time.

We did our volunteering at the Elks lodge on Tuesday evening for their weekly Taco Tuesday.  Wednesday was the celebration of our country’s independence and we chose to stay close to home rather than being out on the roads for the day.  After it got dark, we sat on the deck of the Elks lodge to watch fireworks throughout the Spokane area.  It was quite a view!

The first Thursday of the month is the Spokane Elks RV club monthly barbecue and meeting.  During the week, I had noticed that visiting RVer’s had been grooming and/or letting their dogs and cats sit on the picnic tables in the gazebo.  So, this morning Ken and I brought out the cleaning supplies and washed down all of the tables and benches to make for a more pleasant eating experience at the barbecue.  In between things, I tried to help a friend in Salem get through some computer items she needed help with.  The RVer’s barbecue had a good turnout which really surprised us being the week of the 4th.  There was lots of good food to share, and after the meeting we’re back in the RV relaxing for the evening.

So…until my next update….