We haven’t done this often enough. Jane and I took off for a 200 mile drive to Missoula MT and Ruby’s Inn, where we got a lovely room by the streamside, and had a nice breakfast pre-paid in the room charge, sausage, biscuits and gravy, corned beef hash, scrambled eggs—oatmeal and waffles had we wanted them; plus some little pastries. That’s, between the two of us, equal to a 20.00 breakfast, for sure, so knock that off the hotel bill. Very reasonable. And the walk on the streamside in the morning—gorgeous. The air was chill, so very still even the leaves of cottonwoods weren’t stirring, and birds had to work, not laze along on the winds…. 😉
When we drive we read one of our books ready for pub and discuss, which always means going back in to fix things, which I am doing…happy, happy, that it seems to work.
Progress is good.
We plan to do this more often.
Good for you two! Sounds like a lovely get away. I highly recommends you try an escape up to Banff or Canmore area (just east of Banff and outside the national park). Probably not as wallet friendly as Missoula and you’d need papers on the kittehs vaccinations but the scenery is phenomenal! Not a bad drive from your area.
did you stop in St. Regis at the 50,000$ place for a huckleberry shake????
Oh, we stopped for that shake. 24 ounces with whipped cream atop. To blazes with the diet. AT least for the day.
Yes!!!! Glad you got it…you need to treat yourselves once in a while….glad the trip was good and you had a good time, and got some work done along the way, without it seeming like work.
I hope that one who read was not the one who was driving.
Sounds like a nice trip.
Oh no, CJ has already explained on her old blogsite that one reads while the other drives and the discussion continues throughout the trip. Seems like a productive way to make a long drive less boring. Of course, driving through the mountains on our last trip was ANYTHING but boring, especially when you’re looking for certain wildlife. Still didn’t see the eagles, because my attention was on the road, but did see the pronghorns.
Sounds like a terrific getaway. Think we may start a tradition like that ourselves someday.
Now that you’ve mentioned driving, I’ve been meaning to ask how the Prius is doing.
We adore that car. Y’know how people who like cars like to deal with the mechanics—well, the Prius can be driven like any car, but if you really want it to perform better than the stats, it will. It’s fun to drive, more than any car I’ve ever owned, including 4-on-the-floor. You’ve got a computation constantly of your efficiency and you can get better—talk about your video game.
I thought it might be uncomfy on long drives, or cramped, but it has plenty of interior room, its air and heat come on quicker than any car I’ve ever seen, and it has a lot of whistles and bells like advisement of a low tire (we haven’t had one) and keyless entry—requires some habit changes, but it’s impossible to lock your keys in the car.
We have only two complaints: the microfiber upholstery does hold cat hair fiercely—we can get it, but; and the long run between gas station on a cross country means we have to stop for (ahem!) personal reasons about 3/4 of the way through a 10 gallon tank. We used to have all this choreographed and now we have to find new gas stations at different intervals. We figure we get 50 mpg in city and about 45 on the highway. And we love driving places for half the gas.
I tend to stop and refuel mine when I need refueling, on long trips – that’s about four hours in, roughly 200 miles, as well as first thing on the way in the morning. Mine is now 12 years old, still under 50000 miles (because I walked to the train station for several years and don’t drive much even on weekends). The fill-up this morning got 42-plus MPG, most of it city – it needs to go in for tuning, but it’s in terms of time rather than miles. It’s also still on the original set of rechargeables – knock on wood!
Yep, one thing that was persuasive was the very long guarantee on the rechargeables. And it is possible to get them from the wrecker yard: if the car has a certain mileage on it and that does go down, buying a used but not aged battery pack, they say, is not a bad choice. In our region, the PNW, Prii (to use the Latin plural) are abundant enough that might be an option.
Speaking of rechargeables… DH and I are about to commit solar. We’ve been in negotiations with a local group that is trying to promote renewable energy: all-electric cars, point-source solar, solar water heaters, etc. They were running a deal where you could bundle a solar array and inverter for your house, a monitor for your hot water heater, and a charging station for your electric vehicle, and get a honkin’ great tax credit as well as a good price on the bundle. The offer was limited to some underrepresented areas of our community, and we were on-again-off-again as to whether we were eligible. It’s attractive because our electric bill is substantial (a/c + the server farm).
Due to some people dropping out, we suddenly got onto the subsidized list. The company came up with a package at a price we could live with, so we decided to go ahead. Over the course of the next year, we will be getting a solar array on our roof and new shingles under it (the old shingles were due @ 35 years anyhow). Two weeks ago, they installed the hot water heater monitor, which cuts out the heater during peak hours and non-use periods; we haven’t noticed any impact on the quantity or quality of hot water. No charger, since we don’t have an EV and probably won’t get one for years until we decide to replace the Civic. All in all, if it cuts our $450 electric bill to $50 or less, I think it’s a good investment.
Neat! We’re fortunate enough to draw power from one of the great dams, which is better than some sources, and our regional energy company is funding massive solar farms—when the wind comes sweeping down from the Cascades and out of the Arctic, it does have energy. I look forward to the day when some rivers can provide power simply from the flow, where flood control is not an issue…sinking turbines. http://www.technologyreview.com/news/407732/tidal-turbines-help-light-up-manhattan/ This example takes advantage of tidal flow. But in other places where scenery or history or just the lack of a stable rock formation precludes dams, you could have these. As you don’t see piles of dead birds below the wind turbines, fish read and ride the currents pretty well. They’re not so good at dodging intakes, but some species would take to playing in the current shaped by these highly-geared blades and faring perfectly well. It might be an answer for the salmon runs.