½ Tank #3 & 4

After leaving Chelan we drove on some backroads so that we could visit the Grand Coulee Dam. It was large. Some of mankind’s endeavors are simply astounding. Like dams. And paper. And cars. And space-travel.

From Coulee we went to Davenport and looked around the town museum. Hannah’s family traces back to the city so we asked the woman at the desk if she knew anything about them. She didn’t, but she helped us do some research, which was a lot of fun, even though we didn’t end up finding anything.

As we drove to Spokane we felt like we were already in a different state. The mountains were gone, the trees were gone, and the water was gone. It was kind of sad. Spokane was a bigger city, though, so we enjoyed being there. Hannah met up with one of her friends from high school, and I met up with Karrie, one of my high school friends. As always, I had a lot of fun with her, and I got to see her family for the first time in three years. Hannah and I slept on couches, and didn’t get the best sleep due to a can crying “mom” all night.

On the way out of Spokane I managed to get a speeding ticket. Needless to say, I was not happy about it, and I don’t really know what I’m going to do. I’m thinking I’ll send in a check with a helpless “please don’t cash this” note. I doubt it’ll work, but I figure it’s worth a shot.

Anyways, when we finally, yes FINALLY, left Washington State, we both started to really feel like the trip had begun.

Our first stop in Idaho was Couer d’Alene. We went to the lake and took some pictures, but it had suddenly turned freezing so we didn’t really want to be outside that long. It was still beautiful though.

The next stop was Wallace, ID, a cute little town close to the ID/MT border. We looked in a few antique shops and of course got our picture taken at the center of the universe.

We got to Montana a little while later and were very excited to be two states from home. After a quick stop at the 50,000 Silver $ store and an great picture with a couple of uber hot guys, we headed up to Charlo, a tiny little town that we walked around in about 10 minutes. Hannah and I were both floored by how small the place was, but equally amazed by the surrounding beauty. Hannah’s friend, Jasmine, took us up to MacDonald Lake, which was incredible. On the way back the car was challenged by a bull, but Hannah stared him down and scared him off.

When we got back into town, we stopped at the bar Jasmine works at and got some food. I loved sitting at the bar watching four older cowboys sitting across from us drinking and laughing. The scene was so different from what I’m used to. I wish I had worked up the courage to take a picture, but sadly I did not.

That night we just relaxed, hung out with Barrett, Jasmine’s son, and watched a movie. Hannah and I both passed out once we went to bed, despite having found a hobo spider in our room earlier that day.

We woke up around 11 a.m. (only 10 a.m. our time), got dressed then went to the bison range with Jasmine and Barrett. At first we didn’t see much, but then we spotted a lone elk. Hannah called to him a few times, and he actually answered back. It was very fun. Eventually we found a few bison lounging next to a fence. Hannah and I were very excited, so we jumped out of the car and walked closer to where they were, against Jasmine’s warnings. We decided that the flimsy fence would protect us, and we were a ways away so we hoped we could run faster than them and get back to the car safely. Hannah wanted to test the strength of the fence, so she kept making provocative noises. I made her stop though. As we were walking back to the car, a park jeep drove by. We were so scared they were going to yell at us, but luckily they just passed by. Phew. Jasmine couldn’t believe it. When we turned around to come back we saw a coyote running really fast to on our right. We all got so excited and realized that it was going to cross the road in front of us. It was moving too fast for us to get a good pic, but we just enjoyed watching it. When it got to the left side of us, we discovered that there were three other coyotes waiting and they were all planning to attack a pack of deer (or antelope, we’re not sure which). However, our excited screams seemed to alert the pack, so the coyotes probably weren’t too happy with us. We also saw our elk friend again on the way back, only this time he was standing is a stream getting a drink. He and Hannah talked again for a bit before he wandered off again. We also saw a second-long glimpse of an even bigger elk, but then he ran off. After the tour we bought some buffalo jerky that was deeLISH!

After that we out of Charlo and to Missoula. We were so excited to be back in a “big” city again. We drove around a bit before settling in at a Starbucks to check email and make sleeping arrangements for the next few nights. We overheard a couple talking about Seattle, so of course we asked them about it. Turns out they have a daughter living there and they were heading home from there to Great Falls, MT.

We finally made it to Hamilton, MT where we stayed with Hannah’s friend, Janelle, and her husband, Bryan. We had a lot of fun hanging out, looking at pictures and playing Rock Band. I’m convinced my dreams of becoming a drummer will come true. As long as I’m set on “easy” the whole time.

So far things are going really well. Hannah and I are keeping in good spirits (for the most part), although we may be losing our minds a little. We keep having small communications issues (i.e. one of us mis-speaks and the other gets very confused), but it’s made things more entertaining and it’s good that we’re getting to work on communicating together. An example: while we were in Chelan, Hannah was standing in our room and she said, “I want some juice.” I start asking her if we still had part of the Odwalla that I didn’t finish earlier. I was a little annoyed because Hannah was looking at me like I was a moron and she didn’t know why I was mentioning this. She asked me where it was and I said I didn’t know, probably in the fridge. She’s still looking at me like I’m weird when she says, “Why are you talking about this?” Now I’m really annoyed and I tell her “because you JUST said you want juice.” Her eyes get wide and she asks if she really just said that out loud. I say yes and we both start cracking up. She swears she was just thinking about wanting juice, and I’m convinced I heard her say it. The situation was pretty great.

I keep having little moments where what I’m doing really hits me. I feel like my life has finally begun. Like everything leading up to this has been boring, and the rest of my days will be filled with excitement. And my goal is to make that happen. I hope that some of you reading this will hold me accountable for that.

God bless, over and out.
~Marissa