Sunday July 31

Riverbend RV Park 

Twisp, WA

8AM  76°F.  Clear

Today we're heading south to Pateros, WA in order to bypass Okanogan Pass then east to the Grand Coulee Dam.

During one of the glacial events a lobe of a glacier in Montana created a dam that created a huge glacial lake the size close to one of the current day great lakes 2000ft deep. When the glaciers receded the lake emptied in 48 hrs and carved a path from Montana to the Pacific ocean.

The coulees (eroded valleys) are today's evidence and the Columbia River.

During the 1940s the country was into building dams. The first one we come to this morning is the Chief Joseph Dam Powerhouse. 

The dam construction was started in 1949 and opened in 1955. It was expanded in the 1970s. It hydroelectric generation is the 3rd greatest in the USA. That's the good news. The bad news is that this dam blocks the salmon from their migration: no fish ladders. The dam was originally named the Foster Creek Project and Powerhouse in 1946 and renamed in 1948 in honor of Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce nation who was exiled to a reservation. 

On to the Grand Coulee Dam. Along the way on Rt17 there are large basalt rock left by the ice age flood that scoured the area.

The Grand Coulee dam when built in 1941 it was the largest concrete structure in the world. The sign says it still is (?).

The temp is 96° so we bake for a few minutes and move on. We stop at the Billy Burger drive-in in Wilbur, WA for lunch.

We stop for the night at Wolf Lodge RV Park in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho.

In the evening we meet Delmara & Tom who stopped to talk Airstreams. It seems that not many people are aware that Airstream made trailers with a slide-out. They only did for about 5 years in the early 2000s. They are full timers traveling with their 3 kids. They restored their Airstream over a several year period. We never got a chance to see their work but it was fun talking to them about everything they went through getting back on the road.