Click on a photo to enlarge it.
We drove through pouring rain, sleet and snow and went all the way to Arco, Idaho. At one point the rain was so bad we could hardly see to drive! We went to Pickles
Place for a meal and stocked up on John's spice which we have run out of since the last time we were here. (Great for meat, barbecues and sauces)
It was really sunny the next day and we continued north and found a really small post office in the village of Carey. Helen wanted to send a photo album back home to
her parents and ended up being the first international customer! (A pin was respectfully jabbed into Birmingham, UK on the World map!)
We drove up to Sun Valley and spent some time in the library, catching up on news and swapping books. Then we drove out to a free spot for the night. The next day
we went back to the library, sat out a hail storm and then headed north into the Sawtooth Mountains over the high pass and got to Redfish Lake in the early evening.
We spent four nights at Redfish Lake and did some walking although the weather wasn't the best and we ended up sitting out the rain a lot of the time.
We drove north into Missoula, Montana and spent a lot of money shopping at Wal-Mart and then at Lowe's to get various things for Winnie - new mosquito screens etc.
When we got back to Winnie we saw that he was leaking coolant! The hose attached to the radiator had come loose but we couldn't get the clamp off. So we had to buy
some metal cutters (good job we were parked on the car park of the place that sells them!)
We got the clamp off and found that the metal rim of the radiator where the hose is clamped, had bent when we'd tightened up the clamp the last time it was leaking!
So we put a new clamp on and hunted for a garage who could advise us. Our second attempt got us to a garage where we were told to keep our eye on it and the next
time we need to tighten it we should prise the rim apart and re-attach the clamp. But there was no point doing it now if it wasn't leaking.
So we drove out and headed up to Bigfork. We used our GPS to get to Rosemary and Andrew's house and were taken around the houses and along gravel roads!!! It would
have been far quicker to take the main road!!! So much for GPS!
Rosemary and Andrew were away for the week and we looked after the plants and fetched the post for them. We spent the next five days putting in our new mosquito nets,
fixing various things and generally cleaning up. We also got fairly up to date with our website.
We picked up Rosemary and Andrew at the airport on Monday, 8th June at 8-15pm. We had promised that we would clean their windows and help out with some of the yard
work for them and other odd jobs here and there.
But it wasn't all work! They taught us how to play bridge and we got so into it that we had a hard job sleeping at night because we kept going through various
scenarios and "what ifs". We also cooked a lot together and went out for the famous steak night. We'd been looking forward to that for a long time!
We were also treated to boat rides on the lake and went for walks. We even saw a fawn that had obviously only just been born and could barely walk. But within a couple
of minutes it seemed to pick it up and started hobbling along after mommy.
New born fawn.
It seemed as though the good weather had deserted us just before we left Bigfork and it rained for the last couple of days we were there. But we'd had a great time
and drove the few miles up to Whitefish to visit Lisa who had returned from Costa Rica. It took about four hours just to catch up on everything that has happened!
We only stayed for one evening but had great fun at the local Safeway store that was having a grand re-opening after 7 months of refurbishing. There was lots of free
food tasting and special offers. We spent hours there!! The steak was the best and the chicken enchilada soup got a big "wow".
We went to see Lisa and her mother the next morning and had a cup of tea with them before we left. Then we went back to Safeway and did all our shopping and took
advantage of all the special offers. When we got to the checkout, we also won a $25 dollar gift voucher!
Unfortunately our good mood changed when we got back to Winnie and noticed we were leaking coolant again. So we spent some time readjusting the clamp and trying to
pull the hose on as far as it would go. Then we headed off via Kalispell and then west towards Idaho where we would cross the border into Canada.
We only got 50 miles and the radiator started leaking again! We had to pull over and wait until it cooled down. We were in the middle of nowhere! We waited almost two
hours and then went out into the rain, took off the hose, bent the radiator lip back into shape and reattached the hose and clamp. Then we drove for 5 miles and
stopped again to check it out.
Everything seemed to be alright but for how long? We also needed to find a place for the night and found a side road towards Tepee Creek and pulled off for the night.
We had a day off the next day to sit out the rain and ended up spending another night there aswell so we could get all our papers and everything sorted out for the
border crossing the next day into Canada.
We headed west and stopped at Kootenai Falls for a short walk to the rapids and a swinging bridge. Then we crossed the border at 5pm. It took only five minutes and we
didn't even have to get out of the motorhome!
