We drove ten hours on Saturday and arrived in Missoula, Montana, which is a hippie oasis in the middle of a huge red state. It was cool there--we stayed with an Environmental Science grad student at the University of Montana, and she showed us around the downtown--reminded me of Ithaca, NY. She had a big husky-like dog named Sasha (but Sasha is not a husky....according to dog aficionado Emily).
The scenery was beautiful, we had homemade tomato soup, bought new windshield wiper blades--thank you to the employees of O'Reilly Auto Parts in Missoula--and headed out again the next morning. The speedd limit is 75 miles an hour, and I must say, I was glad.
I think the most beautiful part of our drive, though, was through the panhandle of Idaho. Huge mountains, evergreens, and many larch trees. I guess there is a joke in Monty Python about "the larch"? I don't know--another Emily thing. We took video footage. We got gas in Coeur d'Alene, and I don't think I have ever tasted air for fresh.
The trip through Washington state was not as scenie--very flat, lots of grassland and brush, fewer farms than Minnesota even. But we made it all the way to the coast!
