head east

We left Portland and headed into Washington, stopping in Walla Walla for lunch lunch at the Red Monkey.  We dined on tasty hamburgers before wandering through the downtown area, buying souvenirs and snapping pictures.   Back on the road, following the Lewis and Clark trail, through winding, hilly, wooded, and mountainous landscapes along a river.  We traveled through Washington, Idaho, and into Montana.  There we saw moose, bear, elk, and deer.  We stopped at Lolo Pass and took more pictures of the scenery.  Then we drove on to Missoula, where we rested for the night.  After our complimentary continental breakfast, we got back on the road.  We went to Helena to see the Capitol building.  From there we were heading toward Bismarck, North Dakota.  Along the way somewhere in Montana, we saw a sign warning of cattle drives in progress.  We didn't think much of it.  Further down the road there was a pickup truck on the side of the road with a little old woman waving an orange flag on a long pole.  We thought there must me an accident or something.  As we came around a curve in the road, there were hundreds of cattle crossing, a cattle drive in progress!  Shane and I both grabbed our phones and started recording.  What a great experience! Driving onward, we noticed the landscape becoming more flat and pastoral.  As we crossed into North Dakota, it became rocky and we stopped to view the Painted Canyon.  We stopped and ate barbecue for dinner, then made our way to Bismarck and the hotel for the evening.  It was raining the next morning as we left.  We had to go to the Capitol Building before we got back on the highway. We drove through North Dakota, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.  We met up with Char and Kris in The Wisconsin Dells for the evening.  Shane had never been to the Dells, so we went to the downtown area and walked around for a while.  The next morning, we drove through the rest of Wisconsin, Illinois, into Indiana and back to South Bend.  The first part of our trip completed.