Day 9

We headed out early today to the Glacier national Park.  We could only go in about 15 miles as the Road to the Sun is closed beyond that point for road work.  The original road was built in 1932!  We saw some beautiful waterfalls and stopped at the Montana House. 

A quaint little gift shop that features Montana artist's work, including candy.  Pat showed us some work by a woman named Jean who has providing goods to the shop since its opening 50 years ago!  Yes, I had to buy some.  We also saw Montana Agates, which look nothing like our Lake Superior agates.  They were a translucent grey color with black spots and some had amber colored lines.  We never would ahve guessed they were agates.

Before heading back, we stopped at the train station for our National Park Passport sticker.  Rick ran in and who sold him the sticker?  A man who grew up in Green, just 6 miles from where we live!

On to pick up the tire...The people at Eisinger Motors in Kalispell, Montana were great!  They were very acommodating.  The showroom had a waiting area where they served coffee, tea, fruit and rolls.  Comfortable seating by the fire or you could browse their extensive auto and truck selections.    They finished early, charged less than the estimate, suggested plces to visit, encouraged our return for a longer stay and washed the car. 

We have found Monatana to be a very warm, kind, hospitable State!

Then on to Idaho!  We left Kalispell about 2:30 pm EST drove into Idaho and then north entering Canada at about 6:00 pm EST.  The sun was shining, the skies were blue and it was 53 degrees!  They still had fall color!

8:00 pm EST we left Canada via a road we were not sure was going to take us anywhere.  We crossed a one car steel bridge above the rapids of the Columbia River.  What a sight!  We made the border crossing just 15 minutes before it closed for the night.  The road meandered along the Columbia River between the mountains as the sun began its decent and it was still 52 degrees!

We were all tired even though it was only 5:00 PST now!  We continued along the Columbia River to Kettle Falls.  We actually drove through 8 or 9 little towns along the way and we were in search of a place to stay.  No such luck.  We had to head back east about 7 miles and found the only hotel, a Comfort Inn, for who knows how many miles.  We were able to get a room, but at an out of budget price.  Its a good thing we found some extremely afordable places earlier!  

Tomorrow we head to the coast.