We left Wenatchee after a warm breakfast with Lynda, Jake, and Berkeley. We will keep in to touch but they will be busy traveling next Christmas as they will be in Perth, Australia where Lynda is planning to do an Ironman Triathlon and then visit New Zealand to be with friends. In the spring, Lynda plans to go to Boston to do the Marathon then she returns to conduct the Wenatchee, Marathon. So that takes us until next year and it is hard to plan that far in advance. For now, it is wonderful that we were able to spend this much time with our little family.
We headed east on our way back to Florida taking our time stopping every two hundred miles to take in the sights. Our next stop was to be Spokane. We had driven by it a few years ago when we went to see Lynda compete in the Iron Man Triathlon at Coeur de Lain. Now we were going to take in the home of John Stockton a once neighbor of ours in Salt Lake. We wanted to visit his dad's Ben and Dan's Tavern near Gonzaga University but being Sunday we were not sure it would be open. We got into the city limits and let the Garmin Girl guide us into the Ramada Hotel.
We were rode through the city and we found something unique. There were restaurants everywhere in every ethnic type and the usual fast food restaurants as well. By far the most restaurants were Asian. Here are some examples: Panda Palace, Chinese Buffet, Honk Kong Express, Thai Bamboo, Yuen Sushi, Peking Noodle, Cathay Imperial, Tung Hun Garden, Taste of India, Kay lore Garden, and Chinese Mandarin Foods. Add another list for Italian, Mexican, and Fast Foods in general and you can see that people in Spokane love to eat! But guess what? No Hooters.
We arrived at our hotel early in the afternoon so we decided to go on a bike hike. John got directions about a park that had a route along side of a river so we followed her directions and went to locate the park. As it happened there were two parks with the similar name and when John asked a bi-stander he would get directions going the opposite direction. So for a while we rode up and down the streets not getting anywhere. I checked the maps and came to the conclusion that this was a state park and not one in the middle of the city. So we tried again, and finally found Riverside State Park and the trail that followed the river.
We arrived about four and got out bikes down and noticed other riders starting and some getting off the path. We pumped the tires, got our water and helmets and we were ready. It turned out to be an exciting trail with lots of hills and hair pin turns. The path was well paved and easy for road bikes. There was only one steep hill that we could not pump up, so we got off and walked. This was actually the last part of a trail that began on the other side of town and much of it was riding on the streets which we did not want to do. This part was the most challenging and we saw several riders doing this part more than once. Once was enough for us for this afternoon, and we decided to call it a day.
On the way home we picked up some Kentucky Fried Chicken and salads and decided to stay in for the evening. This would give us an opportunity to map our plan for the second halve of our adventure. We were not set on our part II itinerary so we decided to plan a few stops ahead. Tomorrow we would be going to Missoula "Where a River Ran Through it". Montana here we come!
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