Coeur d’Alene, Idaho

We spent two days touring the beautiful city if Coeur d”Alene, Idaho.  The last time I visited Coeur d”Alene was back in 1980 when I was a working stiff. I said then that it was the most beautiful town I had ever seen. That is every bit as true now as it was then! I remember saying to myself back then, that I had to come back. Well, I made it.

Many years ago when Ms. Pat and I began traveling I told her that one place I had to take her was Coeur d”Alene.  We have tried to make plans to come here for over 10 years and something always came up that kept us from making the trip. I began to think I may never make it and maybe it wasn’t supposed to be. But this year we made the plans to come up here and “finally”,it really happened.


The gardens and flowers in the area are outstanding…..

The streets are all lined with flower arrangements hanging from the street lights…


Ms. Pat and I renewed our vows on a point with the beautiful Coeur d’Alene Lake in the background..


Our good friends Larry and Geri renewed their vows at this beautiful spot with us.. They were the owners and originators of the Broken Arrow Campground just 3 miles from us back home in Custer. They sold the Campground and just happened to be vacationing near Sandpoint, ID and came to tour the area with us..

We camped together at the Elks Club in Coeur d’Alene. It is a beautiful campground with 33 grass sites with water and 50amp electricity hookups. It was so good to have them there with us to see all the sites…


One of the things that always amazed me was this beautiful golf course right near downtown Coeur d’Alene……on the waters edge.


There are many beautiful golf courses in this country, but not many that have the 19th hole out in the lake…  They hit from the T-box on shore and then take a little boat out to this green and do their putting. This is what stuck in my mind as one of the great attractions of this course and I was glad to see it was still here!

I will do my best to put a slideshow here if you wish to see more pictures of the area….. 

Coeur d'Alene _ Aug 2012

Saturday morning early we headed back East towards home. We had one more stop to make and that was an important one that Ms. Pat and I were excited about. We have heard so much about our good friends Mike and Janna’s place near Big Timber, MT. We were finally going to get a chance to see it and visit with them a couple days before we make the last leg of our journey on home. We departed Coeur d’Alene about 7am and it was an easy drive 450 miles to East Boulder near McLeod, MT. We pulled in just as usual at Happy Hour………. Mike and Janna were at the end of their road waiting for us.


Here is a picture I borrowed from Janna that she took as we carefully maneuvered up their driveway… Wow, What a beautiful place!! 

It was a GREAT WEEK!!!!

Thanks for stopping by. Come on back on Wednesday and I may just have a few more pictures……..

Travel Safe and God Bless…

Mike

This Blog is Published every Sunday and Wednesday..

Pictures of Glacier National Park

Here we are!!  It's never too late..... we have been trying to get here to Glacier National Park for 10+ years. Something always came up but we kept trying and finally we made it.  It was truly worth the effort and persistence.....it is beautiful. 

You all ask for pictures and more pictures, so here they are. I took lots of pictures and put them in an Album. This is the slide show or you can click on the picture and enlarge it or go to the album and view them one by one. There are quite a few pictures and they were all taken on the famous “Road to the Sun”. 
As of today we have been gone a week. WOW....seems like we just left home a couple days ago.  The last couple nights we have been parked at the Elks Club in Kalispell, MT. We found lots of sights to see and even found one of these:

An indoor shooting range….  we both got to brush up on our shooting skills and I got to shoot my new sr1911 Ruger 45. We both loved and enjoyed this place...wish there were more like it. Pat and I were both quite impressed with the new 1911…..


Ms. Pat also found a couple of these stores.   Seems we have a new love to check out where ever we go. That’s OK.   I won’t complain because she never says a word when I check out gun stores. However, that said, I just can’t seen to develop the interest in “quilts” that she has in “guns”.
We are off today headed for Coeur d'Alene, ID.  Larry and Geri are over at Sand Point, a few miles north of Coeur d'Alene, waiting on us....so I will get out of here and just say...

 It is a GREAT WEEK!!!!

Thanks for stopping by.  Stop back Sunday and see if we aren’t well on our way home, all the time Praising our Father in Heaven for this beautiful country and all that he has provided us…
God Bless you all.
Mike

This Blog is Published every Wednesday and Sunday..

Hello from Glacier National Park!

We departed Custer just as planned on Wednesday right about 1pm and dodged Motorcycles all the way up to Spearfish. I mean Motorcycles everywhere. They were "Wall to Wall", solid lines of them and many passed me on curves with solid no passing lines and there was oncoming traffic!! What is it with these jerks??  They just go crazy. Don’t seem to have any sense at all. I sure didn’t need to get involved in an accident with one of them, that would really mess up our trip. I was a nervous wreck by the time I got through Deadwood and then when I headed North out of Spearfish, there was only a few on the road……Whew!!  I was glad to be out of that mess…..

At 6pm we pulled into the Red Trail Campground in Medora, ND.  This is the South Headquarters for the Theodore  Roosevelt National Park and home of the Medora Musical show. 


The campground was nothing to write home about, but it served the purpose and they saved us a tight little spot with electric only for a couple nights.


We were up early the next morning and began our drive through trip of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park. The loop is about 30 miles.  This Park is about the same size as Custer State Park where we worked for 10 summers..  The first thing we encountered was a herd of Buffalo.


They have a fairly large herd, I don’t know exactly how many they have but we are used to being around Buffalo, as we worked with them a lot at Custer State Park.


There is mile after mile of Badlands such as this.  They are a little different from the South Dakota Badlands but it's all pretty barren land..


There are lots of neat rock formations…..


This picture is from just inside the park as you look back on the little town of Medora.  The first building in the trees is the Park Welcome Center. I really enjoyed that, as they have a museum with lots of history on President Roosevelt.   I had no idea that he came out here from New York and fell in love with this rugged country and built himself a large ranch. Then he went back to New York and became president.  He kept the ranch and hired people to run it for him in his absence.

Now I’m not much of a history buff so I didn’t know a lot of this stuff. I’m sure many of you can enlighten me even more about this country and "Teddy", especially our friend “The Happy Hatter” from North Ranch in AZ. Bev was part-owner of the Little Missouri Saloon and Dining Room in Medora for 17 years. We found the Little Missouri Saloon but it was a little too early for Happy Hour. 


Another huge attraction in the town of Medora is the Medora Musical. We had heard a lot about it and were told by lots of people not to miss it. I didn’t study a lot of the history of it but it is put on by many, very talented university students from all over the country.   It didn’t start until 8:30 pm so I told Ms. Pat it was out for me, since that is mighty close to my bed time….  


This is a picture of the Burning HIlls Amphitheater where the musical is held. It is at the outskirts of Medora and is in a large canyon. It seats around 2800 people and is huge.  Ms. Pat "suggested" that I go.  She said we should go home and sleep for a couple hours, so we could stay awake for it.    Well, she slept for a couple hours and I didn’t.. I’m not a nap person, never was and probably never will be. I feel it is a nasty habit that is easy to fall I into and hard to break.  It's not for me. 


I knew there was no way I was going to get out of this peacefully, so graciously agreed to go. I also knew if I didn’t go, Geri and Larry would both kill me..   So here is a picture of us in our seats at 8:00 pm as the place started filling up. I wasn’t sure I could do this but I was gonna give it my best….. I was sure the Musical part would put me to sleep.


WOW, soon the place was filled up and the SHOW began….


This is the stage. The place is so steep that there isn’t a bad seat in the house, but we had super close seats just a few rows back..


Soon the houses all move back and it opens up to the wide open prairie and the horses come in bringing the colors. Wow, spectacular!!....as we all sang the National Anthem.


This was the band, the Coal Diggers, that played some beautiful old cowboy songs....that's my kind of music.  The speakers and the sound system were awesome, as was the lighting!!


Wow, this little gal could really play that fiddle… 


This is part of the group cutting up and joking around as the musical began..


Here is the group, the Burning Hills Singers, during one of their acts. They danced and jigged, clogged and changed outfits about a dozen times… I’m telling you it was an action packed show!  As I said before, these youngsters are "super talented"!  We were also treated to a special featured comedy act by "Etta May". 

The time went by so fast and I enjoyed it all so much that I forgot to be sleepy!!   We didn’t get home until after 11:00 pm.  I hadn’t been up that late for ages but let me tell you, I’m sure glad I went as I wouldn’t have missed it for anything!! I would highly recommend it if you're ever in the area!!

I did sleep well when I got home after the show though!! Because we had a long day ahead of us as we were moving on towards Glacier National Park.  I couldn’t believe it but after about 10 years of wanting to make this trip, we were finally on our way….. Praise the Lord!!

This morning we woke up at the Crooked Tree RV Park in Hungry Horse MT. We are just outside of the West Entrance to Glacier.  Ms. Pat is raring to go, so I gotta cut this off and get on "The Road to the Sun". Oh Boy, it is going to be a GREAT DAY!!!

It was a GREAT WEEK!!!!

Thanks for stopping by and come on back Wednesday, we might just still be in this beautiful area..

Mike

This Blog is Published every Sunday and Wednesday..

We’re Outta Here,,,,,,,Glacier NP Here We Come!

Just as you might have guessed, we are all loaded up and ready to head North. Ms. Pat has her dance class this morning and when she gets home around Noon, I’ll be cranked up and reving the engine and spinning the wheels. We hope to get close to Medora, ND tonight, so we can check out Teddy Roosevelt NP tomorrow.

When we get that checked out we will continue on West towards Glacier NP. We received a tip from the Powers family that Hwy #2 across Montana has some serious construction going on from the ND border West. So we will avoid that area by continuing West on I-94. Thanks for the tip. 

Sturgis Bike Week is in full swing up her, just as it has been for the last 72 years. This is a picture of downtown Custer I borrowed from Lee Ann.  Larry and Lee Ann go in every day and dress up in old attire and add to the atmosphere.  Not me...I stay as far away as I can. You can see how clogged up the streets are.   There is no place to park and you can’t get into any of the stores. We can’t get to the drug store or the Post Office, so we just give them the town for a week. That’s not much to ask for all the money the bikers leave with all the merchants. Each year Custer gets a little more bike traffic....mostly bikers that don’t like all the jammed up areas around Sturgis. Most of the locals just stay home or get out of town. We are doing the latter this year. Shortly after noon, we will be outta here!


Rollie and I were talking about the big change in our place in the last couple years. I found this picture taken back in May of 2010. This was just before Rollie and Gina came  and we began building the "Cabin".


Here is a picture I took just a few days ago..  Rollie is right.  The change to our place has been something beyond significant.  Doesn't even look like the same place does it?  A lot of blood, sweat, tears, LOVE (and money!) went into it but Boy-O-Boy, are we ever so proud and enjoying it..  This is beyond any dream Ms. Pat and I ever had of this place..  I believe construction is COMPLETE!! Praise the Lord!!


I even found a nice Buffalo head.. How about that?   Hung it up to set off our new porch.  The finishing touch!

It is a GREAT WEEK!!!!

By my next Blog on Sunday we should be in Glacier NP in Montana.  Come on back and I’ll bring you up to date. Keep us in your prayers for safe travel.

Travel safe and God Bless you all…

Mike

This Blog is Published every Wednesday and Sunday..

Our New Porch

Ta Da........Band Roll…………There it is!! They just put the finishing touches on last night as the sun was going down behind the trees.  There's only one more thing we need....a big, buffalo skull to go on that log right under the big log in the middle of the porch.  This is what we're looking for....

We're looking for one .... know anybody that's got one?? :-))

(click on above slide show to enlarge)

It used to be that you could put a photo from the Web Albums here on the Blog so you could click on and it would take you to the Album. (I think I got it figured out) Now they have changed that so I don’t know how to do it.   About the time I get something figured out and comfortable with it, they change it. Can someone please explain to me how they now do it? I use Live Writer to publish my Blog as they have changed Blogger so much I’m lost there.   Whew, maybe I am getting too old for these computers...I can’t keep up!! My Son Rollie tells me I’m a young man but I think he’s spoofin' me!

We are so glad to have this project finished…. Hallelujah!! NO MORE MESS!   We love the porch and I’m sure we will enjoy it no end. We haven’t even had a chance to look at it or get used to it yet. I told Ms. Pat "NO MORE building…..we’re done.....finished!"   (famous last words)

Ms. Pat and I are going to take a little trip. Yep, for years we have been trying to get over to visit Glacier National Park. Something always came up and we had to cancel the trip.  Plus, I have always wanted to show her Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. I used to travel to Coeur d'Alene in my work and haven’t been there since 1980 but I always thought it was such a beautiful spot, about the best I've ever seen and I want her to see it.

We both have a good case of "Hitch Itch" and definitely need to take advantage of this big, beautiful 40’ Foretravel motorhome.  So, Thursday morning (maybe even Wed after Ms. Pat's dance class) we are going to go North to North Dakota and stop at Medora and visit the Theodore Roosevelt National Park. From there we will take Hwy #2 across the top of Montana over to West Glacier.

We will spend some time exploring Glacier National Park, riding the shuttle on the "Going-to-the-Sun" road and then move on to Coeur d'Alene.  Then from there we will head on back to Custer.   We will stop and see our friends Mike and Janna for a day or two on the way home.   I’m really getting anxious to hit the road and it will be a great trip. We're both really looking forward to it.  I’ll be cranking up the ole' diesel, warming it up and getting prepared.  

Thanks for stopping by and come on back Wed for the last word before we hit the road..  Plus, if you're in the area come on over and sit under our NEW PORCH!

 It was a GREAT WEEK!!!!

God Bless you all and travel safe…

Mike

This Blog is Published every Sunday and Wednesday..

Porch??...What Porch?

More about the Porch later, first I wanted to show you a picture of the Line Dancing class Ms. Pat has put together here in Custer at the YMCA. This picture is complements of Lee Ann. She has a nice size class going and I heard her talking to some ladies at Church Sunday that said they were coming. She loves to do it every Wednesday at 9:30....head on over if you're in the area.


Our Porch builders called and informed us that it would be Wednesday morning before they would get the staining done and begin installing at our place.  Well, one day wasn’t too bad, so we weren’t too disappointed.  But since we decided to go to Rapid City Monday for a little project, we stopped by on the way home so we could check on their progress. They were in the progress of staining the logs and confirmed that they would be here early Wednesday morning. So we are expecting them any minute. 


We were anxious to see what the stain we choose looked like when applied to the logs. Here is a close up of one of the logs after staining. Looks pretty good doesn’t it? Anyhow it passed the Bosses(Ms.Pat’s) approval.


I finally decided it was time for a "Garage Door Opener".   This big ole 10x12 garage door was heavy and a strain for us to open from the outside. It was long overdue and I admit I was procrastinating. But the time had come.  So that’s what we picked up Monday when we went to Rapid as there was one on sale that had our name on it !  I had a little trouble convincing Ms. Pat that I could install it. She insisted that we hire a professional to do it.  Our Son, Rollie, always tells her “I can do that” as he slaps himself on the chest. So I told her that “I can do it” and slapped myself on the chest…… We always get a good laugh out of that and it brings back some very fond memories……..

Well she didn’t believe me and began to search for a “professional”!  She was a little surprised that it was going to cost $175.00 to have it installed, which wasn’t bad. It was the $100.00 mileage charges to come out here and do it that was the corker.  She choked on that one!   I told her again, “Believe me I can do it” as I again slapped myself on the chest!!:-) Needsless to say, she kept on looking for a “professional”!

Meanwhile, yesterday I started putting the Chamberlain garage door opener together.  I had parts strung all over the garage. Since our garage door was 10’ tall and most are only 7’, we had to purchase a 10' extension kit, to the tune of $90.00..  I was reading the instructions when Ms. Pat came out and asked “What are you doing”?   I told her I was going to put this thing up and asked her if she would help.  She asked me if I had ever put one up before, as it looked rather complicated and the instructions were, of course, confusing.  I advised her I had never put one up before, but "I can do it"!!  Remembering the confidence our Son has, had brushed off on ole' Pops somewhat.   I was actually convinced I could do it or I was gonna die trying.  So I went to work..."Lets see....Step 1, install the header bracket.  Ms. Pat took the above picture of me doing that.  I don’t believe she thought this was going to happen. First of all, a couple of years ago, Rollie had forbid me to go on Ladders.  Ms Pat reminded me of that and told me “Well you better be careful”!!  

 
I finally got the door opener all put together, now it was time to build some brackets to mount it.   I must have left my hack saw in AZ, so I cut the brackets with my trusty grinder, that was easier anyhow.


Whew, let me tell you, it was a job and took a lot of ladder work. It made for a long day, as I must have went up and down those two ladders a couple hundred times.   But, for the benefit of my Son, I was careful. It would have really been embarrassing if I had fallen.  When Ms. Pat wasn’t taking pictures, she was holding the ladder for me. I admit, I may go up and down the ladders a little slower than I once did, but see there Son, "I am too good on ladders!!"   Really I am just a young guy in an old man’s body……..  LOL, ya right!!   


Well, there it is!!!!     I’m happy to tell you that along about Happy Hour it was all done.  Installed!!! Hip Hip Hurray!!  Push a button and down she goes!! Push it again and up it goes!!!   Oops, it only goes up HALF way??  What is the deal?  I followed the directions to a “T”.  It works fine, but it will only go up HALF WAY!!!    I was checking to see what it was hanging up on, couldn’t see a thing.  Dang!  I must have done something wrong.


About that time, our friends Niles and Deb arrived on their BIG RED Gold Wing motorcycle.  Niles and Deb are from a little place north of Indianapolis.  I asked Niles what he thought. He looked and looked, we tried it a few more times and same thing, it goes up half way and stops!  We were flabbergasted, I was tired and beat plus it was time for Happy Hour.  Boy, we need a Happy Hour!!   Ms. Pat says wait, I will call this 800 number. Ya, I thought GOOD LUCK……you can never get manufacturers help when you need it. First they will put you on hold for 30 minutes and transfer you to a voice mail box and ask you to leave a number and they will call you back……Right?
 
My comments didn’t slow Ms. Pat down one iota and in 5 minutes she had a tech on the phone explaining our situation.   As soon as she told him that we had put on the 10' extension kit on the door, he stated “OH, that’s your problem, that door is set for a 7’ door”    Hmmm, OK that sounds reasonable, but why don’t they tell you that in the directions?  The tech said they do, and directed her to a page in the instructions that with one tiny little sentence told about it.   So he told us how to make the necessary adjustments as I was up on the ladder turning the little screw a couple turns at a time, each time the door would go up a little farther until it was finally ALL THE WAY UP!!!!      Hip Hip Hurray!!!! 

It's finally HAPPY HOUR!!  Praise the Lord!   Deb brought some Happy Hour snacks and we sat down and visited with Niles and Deb for a "couple of Happy Hours".  :-) They are staying out at Custer Gulch Campground and we hope to get in a little motorcycle ride through the Hills with them before they leave.  By the way Deb, you left your Happy Hour fixins'.  We're holding them for you so if you get by our place, stop in and see how the porch is coming along and pick up them up.

I ran the door up and down every few minutes  while we were visiting just to make sure it really worked. To be honest, I can’t really believe Ms. Pat and I installed that thing by ourselves.  Unbelievable!  I told Ms. Pat   “I told you I could do it”, as I slapped myself on the chest!!!!    Your presence was really felt around here today Son! God Bless You!!


To make a perfect day even more PERFECT, the boys delivered a lot of the logs and rafters for our porch so they can get started first thing this morning..  They should be here any minute….Oops, here they are....gotta go!

It is a GREAT WEEK, as we continue to praise our Father in Heaven for his many, many blessings!!

Thanks for stopping by………..Come on back Sunday and hopefully (no promises) I can show you our new PORCH!!

Travel safe and God Bless…

Mike

This Blog is Published every Wednesday and Sunday..

Still Porchless...But Hopeful… + The Twins.

No porch yet but we stopped by the shop and saw the work in progress.

This is our porch, being built some 20 miles away at Danny’s work shop.


This is the top of our Porch sitting on the ground. The angled cuts on the side logs are where the roof will go.  That is Danny standing in the center.  Danny is truly a master craftsman, but you can easily tell he isn’t from around here. He works barefooted, wears cut-offs and has a pony tail.  He fits the description exactly like the boys we were used to dealing with in Florida where we built our last house. He is another one that visited this area and fell in love with it and stayed. He has built quite a name for himself with his log handy work. His home that he built here in the woods is a big beautiful log home.


These are the poles that our Porch will sit on and this is where the logs are cleaned and prepared. Danny says  this is the kind of a mess we would have in our front yard if he hadn’t built them here at his shop.  I’m glad he did that, cause you know what I say about MESSES!  

There is a lot of work in making one of these Log structures. You don’t just go to the lumber yard and buy the material. We drove around and looked at some of his previous jobs and decided what color stain we wanted.  He says he will stain them at his place, too, because that is very messy and he doesn’t want to get it on our new concrete. 

WOW, I can hardly wait.  I think this is going to look great. They are supposed to bring the porch to our place on Tuesday…Hot Dog!!!  But you know what, I won’t hold my breath. Something usually comes up and delays these type of projects, so I have learned not to get my hopes up too high.  When it happens, it will happen. We were happy to see the progress they were making. 


The weather has been beautiful lately, it has cooled off considerably and we get a little rain now and then. I snapped this picture of the rainbow that we so often get just East of our place. 


I just love this picture of the twin Great Granddaughters that Grandma Michelle sent to us.  What beautiful babies.  That is Cora on the left and Alice on the right. They live in Lincoln, Nebraska and that is where we are headed the minute we leave this place. Shala, their Mom, tells us they are doing great and both very healthy.  Ms. Pat can’t wait to get her hands on them.  Neither can I, but I’m a little afraid of babies. They are so small, I’m afraid I’ll break them. But I’m gonna hold 'em anyhow, and be real careful!!

It was a GREAT WEEK!!!!

Thanks for stopping by, travel safe and may the good Lord take a likin' to ya!

Maybe Wednesday I can show you our new Porch!!    (hope-hope-hope!

Mike

This Blog is Published every Sunday and Wednesday..