Pasco, WA

This morning we took an intersting side trip to Athol, ID, population 696. There may be some of you in my vast readership that didn't know that Durelle and I grew up and were married in Athol (Massachusetts). So we thought a visit would be a good thing to do. Inside the City Hall (shown above, we met a most pleasant lady, Charlotte Hooper. She's the city clerk, food bank director, and I'd bet the de facto mayor, too. We talked for a couple of hours, and learned, among other things, that both towns derive their names from the Scottish Duke of Atholl.

We returned to Coeur d'Alene, packed up and left about 1130. We stopped at a rest area about an hour west of Spokane for lunch. The picture shows a terrain that is very similar to the plains of Montana or North Dakota. It is NOT what you think of when you think of Washington. But, eastern WA has most of its rain stolen by the mountain ranges in western WA and, as a result, is classic prairie. The temperature when we arrived was 90 in a strong sun, but tomorrow will be cooler. We have had no complaints on the weather.