Clearwater River

The last of the blackberries.
Pointy Rock, don't ask, I just liked it.
I like how green the water looks.

Looking downstream

The oasis across the River.

First hints of Autumn

Hollyhocks, gone to seed.
Hops, gone golden.

Crabapple with the beautiful purple bruise.

Virginia Creeper gone to flames!

Change in the Air

The last blooming stragglers...forgotten cosmos, discovered when they bloomed this week!

Sweet surprise!
Virginia Creeper.
I grew it just for autumn color!
I am not disapointed!

The garden gate leading to the jungle!

Grapes!

Pears

On the tree, golden in the sun.

From tree to box, to kitchen counter top....

Pears part two

The slicing.
The arranging on the trays.

Stacked nicely in a warm spot.

Dryed.

Packaged for winter snacks in ski packs!

Firewood

I traded my old Camry for firewood. The camry has been dead for over ten years and just sitting around being a junk car in our yard. So I feel like this trade is a win-win for both me and the guy I traded. This is beautiful larch firewood! And splitting and stacking it is my Montana Jane Fonda work-out!

Hiawatha Trail

The Hiawatha Trail is a "Rails to Trails" bike path in north Idaho.

It is amazing! There are many tunnels and trestles and the terrain is

incredibly steep all around; it was quite the feat to put train tracks through that country!

It would have been thrilling to ride a train over that route!

It is an easy grade up and down the trail and being labor Day weekend, it was very well used.

There is a shuttle bus that takes folks to the top so you can just ride it one way if you choose.

Mike and I rode up and then rode back down.

The weather was perfect, slightly overcast with sun peaking through, not too hot, not too cold.

Trestle on the Hiawatha trail.

Looking straight down!

As I recall, this one was nearly 300 feet high!

There are many interpretive signs along the trail.

All very interesting, but time consuming if you are just wanting to ride.

Mike was a very good tourist and read them ALL!

You need light (and lots of it!) for the tunnels!

On the day we rode there were many other riders and that was helpful.

On our way down the crowds had kind of peetered out and we did go through a couple of tunnels

just the two of us and it was rather disorienting and dark.

Some of them are rather short so you can see the light at the far end from the entrance.

I forgot my headlamp! Oops!

But I did have this handy mag-lite in the camper so I duct taped it on and it was helpful!
It made a fetching ensemble, but it did chatter a bit!

Mike, ahead of me, just exiting a tunnel.

Labor Day Weekend Show

Here is my bike, I am sitting on the settee in the camper looking out the backdoor.

The following shot is Mike waiting for breakfast in the same location

with the morning light filtering in through the pop-up windows.

And the third shot is of the kitchen, note the fabulous upolstery fabric on the settee seat!

You can also glimpse our bedroom...

Our new road trip caravan!

It is really convenient, comfy and fun!

Views from the maiden voyage of the camper and the bike rack and the pick-up truck all aquired by Mike through craigslist!
Mike has been driving the truck, but this was the first trip the truck took with the camper on it.
The bike rack fits on the hitch and the sweet thing is that you can open the door and have access with the bikes on the rack!

Here is our camp site, the second night out.

We were in a sweet spot along side the North Fork of the St. Joe River.

The foto below is our first nights camping spot,

it was along Bullion Creek up the NF of the St.Joe when we were enroute to

the Hiawatha bike trail.

We left home and travelled over Thompson Pass into Idaho, went over some other pass into Wallace and then took some 30 mile dirt road toward the

Hiawatha Trail Head nearest to Avery Idaho.

Zippity-Doo-Dah!

Whitefish Mountain Resort (AKA Big Mountain in Whitefish, MT) Zipline.

This is a new summer feature at the resort.

We thought we needed to try it out.

It was a girls day out.

This is the end!

You come flying down and hit the big springs with the pads and in this case you come in with a enough force that if flings you back onto the line and you have come back in with less force.