The second we saw Larry we were smitten.  There he was, in a shop that was closed, looking at us with big eyes.  We could tell right away that he wanted to go home with us.   We were in Sandpoint, Idaho on the first day of a two day road trip, the eventual destination of Golden, Colorado for a wedding.  I’d never heard of Sandpoint but it’s a cool little resort town in the mountains, surrounded by gigantic Lake Ponderay where lots of rich and famous people have second homes.  And we fell in love with a Bulldog.  He was colorful, muscular and had a spiked collar on which told me he was a boy.  He looked like an English Bulldog but had French Bulldog ears.

Road Trip!

The next day, after a hike and breakfast we made a beeline to the shop, hoping Larry was still there.  Yes!  He was waiting for us.  After about 10 minutes, Larry was ours.  The shopkeeper said his name was Spike but to us he was Larry.  Tom went to get the car.  All of a sudden it dawned on me, we were on a road trip.  Would Larry be a good traveler?  We put him in the backseat and went on our way to our next destination:  Kallispell, Montana.  Larry was the best Bulldog ever. Nary a peep.  We checked our handy dandy hotel tonight app on the phone and found a place to stay.  Would they take Larry?

Larry ended up being perfectly happy in the trunk.

A perfect road trip is one in which unexpected things happen. We didn’t expect to be eating Yak burgers and Boar burgers in Kallispell, MT. I have looked for large metal flowers forever but didn’t expect to get those in Bozeman, MT. Bozeman was one of those places I am pretty sure I could live in and be happy. We stayed at the Pronghorn Inn in Lander, WY. Lander is a one street town but the home of NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School), where our son had gone between his Senior year in HS and college. He spent a semester in the Rockies. They have a brand new building and we were poking around in the evening, when someone came out the front door and asked what we were doing. We got inside information on where to hike and got a personal tour the next day. Completely unexpected!

We spent five days altogether in Colorado between the wedding and seeing old friends.  We headed home through the same states we had been through on the way down, but different places.  Surely the trip home would be boring.

The wide open spaces of Wyoming ~

We made really good time through Wyoming as it’s wide open roads and high speed limits.  Instead of pulling off the freeway at a fast food place for lunch we decided to go into one of the towns off the freeway.  The very small town was further off than we thought, but so glad we did. We ate at the Huckleberry Cafe and the food was wonderful!  Giant grilled sandwiches and an expresso ice cream shake for dessert.  The owner talked our ears off and had a guest book for us to sign.  So much better than McDonalds.

We made it to Burley, Idaho that night and the next morning, realizing that Twin Falls was only 40 miles away, we headed there for breakfast.  We turned into Twin Falls and ran into a canyon!

Twin Falls is the only place in the Country that you can base jump without a permit. We saw that also and then hiked to the place where Evil Knievel made his famous try at jumping over the Snake River Canyon. That’s Tom on top of the Evil Knievel jump off point.

We spent most of the day in Twin Falls and then headed to Boise, Idaho. This is the place we were meant to live.  We found a hotel through our hotel tonight app and then headed downtown to dinner.  We hit restaurant row where all the restaurants had outdoor seating and everything was jam packed.  We went into a place called Fork that was full inside also, but we could sit at the bar.  This bar was spectacular. The building itself was a former bank and the people were so friendly!  The guy sitting next to us insisted we try his appetizer as it was so delicious. His girlfriend insisted we have some of their onion rings.  We offered them tastes of our food. My Idaho trout was out of this world. We had a bottle of one of the best Rose’ wines I’ve ever had.  It was local and the winery is called “Cinder.” Who knew Idaho made wine?

The next morning as Tom opened the curtains in our room, we saw this:  A hot air balloon festival.

Needless to say we made a beeline to the park.  

After a trip to Cinder winery and a case of wine later, we headed into Oregon where we spent the night in Pendleton, a true cowboy town.  I was in heaven.  The very definition of a perfect road trip.

I am still working on my idea for ongoing blogs and really, it’s coming soon!

Any ideas for a road trip?  We have decided that is the best way to travel and we are now road trippers.