navelgazing.omphaloskeptic.net Journal

Getting There - Aneel's Travelogue

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Selkirk Loop Ione, WA, Thursday, 25 August 2011 10:34pm

This morning I rode north to Sandpoint, Idaho, to start along the International Selkirk Loop, a scenic route through Idaho, Washington, and British Columbia. I had lunch in Sandpoint at a place that specialized in pies (chicken pot pie for the entree, raspberry-blueberry-boysenberry for dessert) and then set out on the Loop.

Flowery Trail Road is now my favorite road of the trip. It's a curvy, mountainous road, wide enough for logging trucks to make the turns, but currently deserted. I stopped for a view of a waterfall, and passed lakes, meadows, and lots of trees.

At the end of Flowery Trail Road, I stopped in at the Historic Tiger Store, the only building left of the town of tiger and got some information.

I had been hoping to make it to a point near the border for a tour of the Gardner Cave, but the last tour was going to start before I could get there. It's probably a good thing that I didn't rush up there for the tour, since the campground nearby where I had planned to camp is closed.

I ended up camping at a Cedar RV Park in Ione, where I was the only tent camper in a large expanse of lawn. The owner of the place was super-friendly. It turns out he used to work at Lawrence Livermore National Labs, where I spent a summer after high school. He did some construction work on the Nova Laser, which I think was the coolest thing at LLNL when I was there.

181mi in 5:05. Seattle to Ione: 955mi in 3 days. SF to Ione: 2349mi in 9 (riding days).