Wordy Wednesday - Oh Canada! (#WW)
Welcome to the third installment of my what I did on my summer vacation post. You can read the first two installments here and here. I headed to the Pacific Northwest - specifically Washington, Idaho, and Montana, as well as a very, very short jaunt into Canada...which is up today.
We began our journey on Sunday morning of our vacation by taking a drive around Lake Coeur d'Alene. We saw a little bit of wildlife including this deer. There was an amazing amount of gorgeous scenery on this day. The problem was the road was curvy and there were few pull offs, so while I got some photos - most were of the point-the-lens-out-the-car-window-and-hope variety. We also met some friends for lunch at a local restaurant. Paul and his wife had just relocated to the Coeur d'Alene area from Bloomington, Indiana. Chuck had worked with Paul at our college, so we met up for a nice lunch.
After lunch, we headed north along 95 towards Canada...our goal was Creston Canada. As we drove, again - loads of gorgeous scenery. However, since we left pretty late in the day, we had very little time to stop and still make our goal of getting to Canada and hoping to see something in Creston. We did make one stop in Sandpoint, Idaho at the very nice Pend O'Reille Winery. The winery had a delicious huckleberry wine as well as several other very nice varieties. Of course, since we live in Indiana, we couldn't have anything shipped back home. And, because we were heading north to Canada we were fearful of buying anything to try to travel with so we just had to enjoy during our brief visit.
We passed through the border crossing with no difficulty. Creston was just a few miles up the road. We arrived in Creston right around 5:30 p.m. local time...on a Sunday night. Luckily the visitor information center was actually still open (they stay open until 6 p.m.) so we could go to the restroom - but that was it.
While it was late and we didn't get to really visit in any of the shops or stores, one of my eagle eyed friends spotted the mural painted on a store wall, featuring a Munro hotel. [Forgive brief genealogy segue...] All Munro's hail from the same klan/family group in Scotland - even those of the derivative spelling that belongs to my family...so all of us - whether Munro or Monroe - originated in the same place...or so the story goes. [End genealogy spot]. From the little bit of research I've been able to dig up on the Internet machine, it appears John Munroe owned his Queen's hotel in the late 1800's and early 1900's. He appears to have sold the hotel in 1910.
And just so we had proof we actually were in Canada, I captured this grab of the sign pointing towards the USA Border.
We headed back down 95 - again enjoying truly amazing and beautiful scenery but it wasn't all that great for photography.
Never fear though. Next Wednesday I make up for this week's vacation picture deficit as we explore the Flathead Lake area in Montana! See you next week.
I'm linking up this week with Better in Bulk's Wordless Wednesday.