On to Golden Valley, Minnesota…

My daughter, Michelle, had moved…from Walla Walla, where she’d been living for several years since her divorce, to Golden Valley, Minnesota. She’d met a guy online and ended up moving to Minnesota to be with him. Ain’t that sweet?

Anyway, I leave Walla Walla early morning after the nice visit with family, and head north. I only visited with family for one day though, because by now it’s September 26th and I wanted to get to Minnesota before the weather turned wintry anywhere along the route. According to the long term weather predictions, I had the best chance of an uneventful trip if I traveled at this time. I headed northeast actually, since my mapping program said that’s the best route. I’d get to go through Prescott, Dayton, Spokane, Coeur d’Alene, and beyond. And I’d get to travel through country I’d not seen in 40 years. And just one days drive would get me clear to Great Falls, Montana or there abouts.

Wheat field just outside Walla Walla.

We have windmills here too.

Skirting Spokane. Note both the dried grass and the evergreens. Yippee, in Idaho all ready. There’s lake Coeur d’Alene. The lake is really long. And suddenly, I’m in Montana. Time for a lunch break. I’m in the foothills now. And we have prairieland here.

And soon I was driving through the flats of Montana. Tooling along at 65 MPH, on a 4 lane freeway, light traffic when suddenly the highway turns mean in the slow lane. Frost heaves or something. Ruts and bumps in the ‘truck’ lane I’m in, usually attributed to the abuse a roadway gets from heavy trucks. Starts banging my RV around. Dishes clatter, insecure objects flutter or dive to the floor and wander around, unfettered. That’s the truck lane for ya…the slow lane as it were. Pull over into the fast lane and it all smooths out. Drive a couple miles and pull back into the slow lane. Same thing, it’s banging my RV so hard I’m worried about the tires and frame, not to mention tons of stuff inside the living space. So I pull back into the fast lane. Speed limit here in the boondocks is 75 MPH. I’m going 65 MPH.

I keep a close eye on my rearview mirrors and when a car appears in the slow or the fast lane, I pull over so they can pass me using the fast lane. The cars are approaching me like maybe once every two to three minutes. Sometimes maybe 5 minutes. And I always move over for them. I can see for miles behind me and miles ahead since the freeway is on flatland. So this goes on for 1-2 hours, and I’ve been the courteous driver now the entire time, when suddenly, a black pickup truck, newer model, appears alongside my RV’s passenger side and honks their horn. What the hell, how did I miss him? Then the guy zips in front of me, and stands on his brakes. He’s like 25 feet ahead of me and I just let off the gas. Ahh, now I know how I missed this asshole. He’d been going 85 MPH or so instead of the speed limit of 75 MPH. Now he’s trying to teach me a lesson…that I’m not suppose to be in the fast lane blocking him from speeding.

Then he stomps his brakes again, and I just apply mine until my 22,000 lb vehicle is right on his tail. Maybe 6 feet away. At 50 MPH. Hmmm. Maybe I’ll do a pit maneuver on this a-hole and knock him off the road into the slight ditch we had alongside. Nah, he might have a kid in the truck.

So I’m just hanging there on his tail, ignoring his bullshit as he slows. Laughing at him. Pretty soon we’re both only going 35 MPH. Lalalalalala, I’m still laughing at this dumb ass and hanging right on his tail because,

1) HE’S the one in a hurry. I’m retired. I can go 35 MPH all day. ALL FUK’N DAY.

2) My rig weighs 22,000 lbs, his maybe 9,000. Guess who would win that fight?

3) What he’s doing is illegal as hell, what I’m doing, not so much. He’d get a huge ticket, me, a little one…maybe. Being in the fast lane when there’s no MIN speed listed isn’t that big a deal on a 4 lane highway. But after explaining why I was in the speed lane, doubt any cop would give me a ticket on that stretch of lonely, lightly traveled road.

Finally, the guy decided that he’s not going to get me to pull into the other lane, so off he goes. I wait until he’s out of sight and check the slow lane again…still bumpy as hell, so back to the fast lane the next hour or so until I spot a RV park and pull in to spend the night. That was fun, but I didn’t think about getting a picture of the guys licence plate and sending it to the Montana troopers. That would have been great.

That evening a huge storm pulls in and parks over us. Barely had enough warning to pull my awning in. The wind went from zero to 35 MPH gusts instantly. Glad I wasn’t driving in it. Rain starts up before I even had the time to get the awning all the way in. Rains most of the night. Heavy rain wakes me up early the next morning so I’m on the road at daybreak when usually it would be 9 AM, not 5:30 AM.

A couple hours later it’s moved on east of me. Still in Montana. Gah, this state is toooo big. I’m more than halfway out of the state though. See the ‘you are here’ note on the map? Damn this is a big state… Spent the night near here.

Next day was more of the same, not much in the way of interesting roadside attractions and whatnot. But the storm that I was hit by the other night was moving fast towards the east. Luckily it was moving faster than I was. Here’s a look east the next morning.

And then late that afternoon, after I’d turned due south.  Seems the storm wasn’t supposed to get very far south either. So, that’s good.

Soon I was at a RV park near my daughters apartment. She still, after some 4 days, had not gotten back to me about the possibility of parking my RV nearby their apartment complex, anywhere the rig would be safe while I visited with them. So I had headed to my back up RV park selection. Met them the next night for dinner at a very nice Mexican place that had vegetarian dishes.

And here’s my beautiful daughter next to my ugly mug. Damn, I’m getting old.And of course, told them I was up for anything and to give me a call whenever. But of course, young people these days, they never set anything up and didn’t call me until the night before I’d told them I was leaving. Kids. Kind of made me sad they couldn’t find the time to visit some more.

I was in a race to get further south because there were predictions of fairly bad weather heading this way, including snow flurries. It was the first week of October…but I’d already extended my week long stay by 5 days and didn’t feel I could stay here any longer. Well, whatever, they couldn’t make it over to hang out so I went ahead and started my trip south.

When I left Minneapolis, I fully expected to just head due south until I bumped into the Caribbean, then visit New Orleans.  But, while on the road, I saw a sign to St. Louis. What the hell. Haven’t been there in years. Maybe I’ll go visit the St. Louis Gateway Arch. It’s all shiny. So, left I went.

That’s all for today.