The Long Road Home- Day 4

It was a very cold, and very foggy morning. The frost on the car was a clear indication to me that I was going to need something on my head if I was going to keep the heat in and not freeze my patootie off!

If you look closely, you can see the frost on the car.....

The doors were almost frozen shut.  You could hear a "crunch" when you pulled on the door handle.

 Chris decided to run the stuff out to the car through the door so that I didn't freeze with the window being open for so long while trying to get ready to go.

We grabbed breakfast along the way and traveled on down the road toward our next destination.....the scenery was just breath taking along the way.

There we were.  Traveling along, chatting and somehow discovering that we suddenly had no lights in some of the parts of the car.  The dash was fine, but no lights in the glove box, no lights in the ashtray or clock, etc.  

We took the car to a shop and they didn't have time to work on it and we didn't have time to stay over.  I should say though that before we left Oklahoma, Chris took the car to be serviced and they said the high beam light was out.  We thought it would just be a simple thing of changing the bulb, which he opted to do along the way. Little did we know.  Chris changed the bulb and it still didn't work.  We checked the fuses and one was out.  We (he) replaced the fuse with the spare that we had.  NOTHING.

Needless to say, it was a very cold few minutes trying to get it all sorted out.  We never did get things working.

An now, we are about to drive into some serious fog......

And it looks like it's going to get pretty hairy for a while.

We know we wanted to get to a shop and have it diagnosed if possible before we cross the border, but that might not be possible.

After what to me seemed like some nerve bending moments without tail lights, we began to emerge from the fog.

coming out of it was a great relief, but we still had several hours of driving ahead of us that would probaby take us into the night.

 We came upon St. Regis, Montana and decided to take a break.

It reminded me of a mini Cracker Barrel store with all manner of things including this huge fish tank that you know who decided he was going to get into through a whole in the middle.....ha.  I think he is a pretty good catch....:-).

They had several other tanks that had the ugliest looking trout you ever want to see.

After leaving St. Regis, we traveled on toward the next destination.  I really enjoy all of the fall colors.  Unfortunately, after I got over my "awe" of what I was seeing, I had often missed the shot I wanted to take with my camera.

And then we hit the border of Idaho......we are getting closer to BC with each passing day.

However, somebody was needing some "pick me up".  So, we stopped to grab some coffee at a drive through espresso shop.  Mr. McGrumpy.......:-(.  Poor guy was hanging on by a thread, but insist on driving anyway....

We placed our orders and took some pictures of the little placards outside on the wall.

here is the menu, but I ordered off of a another menu that they had posted.  My drink was called a "Brave
Bull".  It was two shots of espresso, with coconut and almond.

 Mr. Chris is deciding if he wants a cookie to go with his java.....:-).

After driving along for a while longer, we crossed the state line into Washington and it went past so quick that we didn't even get a chance to get a picture.  But here we are in Colville, Washington. We both were in agreement that if we moved out of Canada, having a place here would be great.
  

This is a shot of the main street.....

About ninety five miles down the road is a little town called Oroville, Washington.  Five minutes away from the Canadian border. We decided to stop here for dinner and have a decent "hot" meal for dinner.  I was TIRED of road food.  This park was across the street from the restaurant.

What a beautiful place......

Try as I may, I was not able to capture the beautiful that I was seeing through my little camera....

 Here are a couple of other shots of the town...

I love how all of these tiny towns have murals on their walls that tell the story of their beginnings.

and more beautiful trees.....:-)

The water looks like glass in the distance.....

And some of the trees look like someone stuck them in their to fill in a hole.....

this is one of my favorites......:-)

Ms Vickey and Maj seemed to be hanging in there although they are both very filthy now from all of the road dirt they have accumulated during the trip.

Time to eat!  I nice hot meal would be great.....

You know who beat me to the door.....haha.  We were pretty hungry!

I was glad to see the fire place inside as it was a bit chilly outside.

This will be my last American meal unless I cook it myself for a while.......:-(. I'm missing my home already.

We had a couple of things to do before crossing over.  The declaration form had to be filled out for one thing.....

Our food came and we were glad to see it.  Chris ordered a salad of some sort and I order some Jamaican pork with coconut shrimp, rice and grilled veggies with pineapple.

The last thing on the list to do before crossing over was to change the sym card in my phone back to the Canadian carrier.  I had secured it to the card that my T-mobile sym card came on.  It was just a matter of peeling it off and popping it in once I got the other one out of the phone.

We hurried and ate dinner since  we needed to get back on the road before the sun set.  We still had that tail light situation going on....

After going through a "Not a Nexus Line" interview at the border, we crossed into Canada two days ahead of schedule.  We made a side trip to visit Chris's 90 year old mother and spend some time with her before making our 6 hour trip to our own home.  So, this is where we will be for the next few days.  

And so ends The Long Trip Home.  We enjoyed having you with us in the  United States, the European vacation and the gardening that took place in these past few months.

Thanks for coming along with us!!  See you next time!