OVER THE MOUNTAINS

We made it over all those passes in the Cascades, and are sitting very close to the Idaho border right now at lunch time. Tonight we'll be sleeping in Idaho, and be out of the state by tomorrow night, I think. It has been cold and wet for a few days now, and we are hoping for some warmer weather and a tailwind soon. Our last pass was SHERMAN PASS, and it had the highest elevation. As we were beginning the climb, after about the 6th mile up on HWY 20, we saw three young girls riding horses in the middle of the road coming towards us---waving orange flags and banners and yelling something. I thought they were little giddyup girlz, and I yelled back at them "Y'all are so cool!" and I asked Kami if she could understand them. She couldn't. We rounded the next bend and saw that some ranchers were moving a herd of cattle down the narrow road, and they were taking up all of it and then some! The cows balked when they saw our bikes, and started acting rather rambunctious. We leaned our bikes on the railing and jumped over to the other side as a bunch of cowboyz got behind the cows and started moving them. There were about a hundred cows and calves, and a dozen or so cowboyz---plus one very talented dog. We waited about 15 minutes for the herd to clear, then continued riding up hill through the untidy messes left behind by the bovines. That night we asked Carmyn, who is from a ranching family, if the cows were going to the slaughter house, and she laughed and said, "NOT THOSE COWS". for one thing, you don't eat "cows", which was news to us (you eat heifers and steers) and for another, you don't "drive" cows to slaughter, you want them to be vacationing and taking it easy I guess.

After we got to the top and started a rocket ride downhill, we saw a big moose standing next to the road in a clear pond. We stopped for as long as he would let us watch him---he ambled into the woods and we got back on the rockets.

So far, we are having an excellent time---I'm hungry all the time, but finding a lot of stuff to eat, and although the libraries are few and far between, I love stopping in and checking my mail and "blogging". We camped last night at a spot known to have black bears---Kami had her pepper spray, but not her 50 foot rope. I wasn't allowed to have my toothpaste in the tent! No bears though---just a nice night for camping. We had a campfire, and listened to an old radio program that David has on CD---SGT. PRESTON OF THE CANADIAN MOUNTIES, and HIS SUPER DOG KING. This was better than the last one we listened to, which had a cowboy named PALLADIN, and his Chinese sidekick---apparently named "Hey Boy". That was kind of lame.

My library time is expired. More from the next stop---