August 12, 2015 Wednesday - Exploring

Today we went exploring.  We first stopped in CDA (Coeur D'Alene) and got gas and ice for the cold drinks.

  Then we were on our way to Wallace, ID, about 60 miles east on I-90.  We stopped at the visitor center and picked up some brochures.  

They have many historic homes on a walking tour and three museums.  I guess we didn't think this through very well, because we had our dogs and the weather was very HOT and WINDY.  Since we did not want to leave the dogs in the pickup, we drove by the old houses.  Most of them appeared to be occupied, so I guess they were not available for an inside tour, which we would have liked. 

So anyway, we ditched Wallace and decided to go to the Sunshine Mine Distaster Memorial.  It is a statue off to the right of I-90.  We got the dogs out and they were so excited to see the chipmunks!  We walked around it and jumped back into the air-conditioned pickup. 

It was good I had an alternate plan.  My next exploration was to drive up a forest road near Kingston, to see Kit Price Campground.  You get off the interstate at Kingston exit and then drive up forest road #9.  OK we did this, and drove and drove.  Finally we came to a spot that was for day use so we got the dogs out and walked down by the river.  We decided to scrap going to the forest campground, since we didn't know how much further it was.  Maybe another day. 

We took the Old River Road back (just on the other side of the river) to get a different view.  Boy was that exciting.  We were driving along and heard the whump, whump of a helicopter.  

It swooped down right beside us and got a bucket of water out of the river.  Before we knew it, here came another one.  Steve got out his camera and got some really good shots of the helicopter dipping water out of the river.  There were two helicopters, so we hung around awhile and watched them.  Steve took lots of pictures and I took several with my iPhone.  I wish my phone had a long lens on it!

We saw some interesting rock formations also and I took pictures of them also.

Next we stopped at Old Mission State Park. 

This is the oldest building in Idaho. It was built by the Coeur d'Alene Tribe in cooperation with the Society of Jesus (Jesuit priests).  It was extremely hot up here on the top of the hill, over 100 degrees and still windy.  After a short look around we decided to head back to the RV.  We got there late and did not tour the visitor's center - maybe we can return and check it out.

Big Day Touring!