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Sunday, October 19, 2014

The Old I-90

I told Derek* this would happen. Totally warned him. I could see the future. Plans to take a road trip on the "old" I-90 route across the Cascade mountains, and I had to park in a garage in Seattle and meet him so that he could drive.

Me on Facebook chat:

Amy Gurley
I'll try not to be late but ill guarantee you I will get lost and or turned around

And me on trip day:

Amy Gurley
I don't even know if I'm in the right damn garage 

Sigh.  I think I'm in the Hilton garage

It was almost funny because he had manged to call me, find me on the streets of Seattle, and while on the phone, essentially chaperon me into the correct garage. This was not my finest moment.

After all that drama was over however, we had a great time. Derek had the whole thing mapped out. Literally. Old school print out of Mapquest with odd stops to make along the way.

[It's sad that "old school" is now considered Mapquest as opposed to physical maps.]

It was raining on the west side of the mountains, but once we got over the top of the 
threshold, it was gorgeous out and the perfect temperature. Our first stop was a 
small "ghost town" called Roslyn. Neither one of us could figure out why it was called a ghost town as it had 900 people living in it.

It had a very "old western" vibe. And our first stop was a curiosity gift shop that had a bunch of stuff from a show called Northern Exposure. Apparently it was filmed in Roslyn, WA and the town was taking full advantage of this.

I guess the show took place in Cicely, Alaska, which doesn't actually exist, so this is probably the coolest shot glass in my collection.


[If I can find one of Eureka, Oregon that would make me so happy.]

We took a short hike to find some coal mines but never encountered any. It was disappointing.

After Roslyn, we stopped in Cle Elum. He told me of this bakery that got good yelp reviews, so we stopped to eat lunch there. I mean, it was a bakery, so my lunch consisted of a cherry turnover and some kind of flat cinnamon roll-thing with walnuts on it. Well, they were good at least. He also had a telephone museum on his list of stops.

Really? A telephone museum? I think I'm okay with never visiting one in my lifetime.

Unfortunately, (or maybe fortunately in my case), they only have it open between May and September. Okay, next!

After Cle Elum was a stop at the old Thorp Mill. 

[Side note: Derek got turned around a lot. He doesn't use Google navigation and was apparently showing me how much worse his Nokia phone does at directions.]

I pretended to read all the interesting tidbits that the self-guided tour provided and spent time taking pictures. We were swarmed by gnats or some kind of tiny flies the whole time. It was disturbing.

Next on the list was Ellensburg. We were surprised to find out that it was a University town. I guess this is why most people skip it on road trips. But, I had a one track mind of finding a shot glass here.

We parked and decided to walk the streets. It was a cute town with some interesting architecture. 


I showed him how bad my memory was by asking a bookstore owner about perhaps finding a place that sold shot glasses and she proceeded to give me the name and walking directions to a place and then I promptly forgot them. Well, I hadn't really. But we did walk around a while before a resident of the town told us we should stop arguing about it and asked us where we were trying to get to. Both Derek and I agreed that we surely hadn't been arguing.

It's good when we can both agree that we both hadn't been arguing. This is the sign of a healthy relationship.

We finally found the shop but it being a college town they only had college shot glasses. This was sad. I don't think the town likes itself very much.

[Also, the lady was totally following us. Even when we got back to the car and proceeded to leave the town, we saw her crossing the street in the opposite direction she'd been walking before. I think she was the ghost of Ellensburg.]

Beyond Ellensburg was a pit stop at the Fruit and Antique Store in George, WA. (Yes, Washington has a town called George. Were you not expecting this?) Nothing much to say here except we both picked up something called Vine Smoothie to try. He grabbed the Strawberry and I took Peach. The cashier gave us some decent tips about drinking it in shots if we didn't like it. Derek was convinced I would have been best friends with this girl because we both like fruity wines.

Our final destination was the town of Moses Lake. It was getting late at this point; the sun was beginning to set and we were both hungry, but I insisted we make one more stop along the way. The Iron Horses.



We decided to climb the small mountain. The rocks were loose and it wasn't easy nor incredibly safe. But despite the promise of danger, we climbed it while the sun was setting, and I got some awesome shots. 

I slipped on the way back down, but it was all in the name of a good photograph so it was totally worth it.


The last stop of the drive was a simple diner called Bob's. Apparently, Derek had eaten there in the past and liked it. We had a bet on how old the waitress was. No wager but pride. We both gave our guesses at the same time. I said 22, he said 23. One of her co-workers answered that she wasn't even 21, so I won :D

The drive back was uneventful. It was a long day for me for sure; I didn't get back to the parking garage until 11pm and still had a 1 hour drive home from there. Thankfully, I had better luck leaving Seattle than I did at arriving. It just goes to show you, attitude can make all the difference!

*Name changed to protect the strange

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