Leaving Yakima was kind of exciting in that we were excited to be leaving the campground. It wasn’t very good (Yakima, itself, seemed perfectly lovely and has a lot of good history to explore). We woke up plenty early and had a light breakfast. It was already getting warm before 8:00 when Henry and I went to check out the playground. After a little time on the swings, Henry was ready to head back to camp and we started getting ready to depart.
I think “RVing” as a thing in its own right really appeals to certain personality types, especially those of us that appreciate a technical process. RVing is full of technical processes. One of the most universal (that is, universal among truck camper or camp trailer or fifth wheel trailer or motorhome) of those processes is the departure check list. Running the departure check list is a time-honored tradition wherein a lucky participant goes around the RV immediately before setting out on the day’s travels, ensuring that windows are closed, cabinets are secure, vents are shut, and -most important of all- the refrigerator is locked.
As a kid with a computer and dot-matrix printer, I relished the opportunity to make check lists every year and then follow them when it was time to launch. It was with some amount of youthful exuberance1, then, that I set about making a checklist for our camper basically the moment after we acquired it.
Back to the story at-hand: after I’d done my checklists for truck and camper, we were off and on our way to Sagle, ID and Springy Point Campground at Lake Pend Oreille. (If you, like me, are new to saying words like, “Pend Oreille”, think: Pond O-ray.) The drive was relatively relaxed, heading up highway 20 out of Yakima and meeting I-90 at Ritzville. From there it was interstate traveling up to Spokane and then on to highway 53 at the Idaho border, up to Lake Pend Oreille. No significantly mountainous terrain on this drive and our relatively early departure meant that we were through the worst of it before the real heat came on. We were on the road by 9:00 AM and made camp by 3:00 PM.
Google Maps suggests that it takes four hours, 20 minutes to make that trip, so our time of approximately six hours gives you an indication of what our pace is like. A typical day of travel includes stops for fuel every 150 - 200 miles (our safe range is about 275 miles but that is getting the fuel tank a little closer to empty than I like), bathroom stops, a lunch stop, and if anything catches our eye as a fun place to visit, a stop for that too.
Lake Pend Oreille is a picturesque place with multiple beaches for young folk to swim and at least a couple of boat launches. Our campground didn’t have hookups and it would definitely behoove you to pay attention to the site lengths in order to get an idea of how long of a rig is too long. We stayed in a great site on the lake side (site 28) of the west loop but it was really steep going down to the site. I don’t think you could put much of a camp trailer down there and even if you did, it would be a pain to level. There were other more level spots and overall I think it is probably best for truck campers and shorter (sub-30’ which is somehow considered “shorter” these days) trailers and motorhomes.
No hookups mean no air conditioner, so we walked down to the lake for a dip before dinner and slept with the door open to help beat the heat (glad I had time to fix the screens in the camper back in spring) and when we read the next day about “the bear situation” we were glad that we weren’t mauled in our sleep.
After a good night’s sleep devoid of bear problems and a light breakfast, we were eager to get on the road and head for Montana.
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The youthful exuberance of a kid with a computer and dot matrix printer. Print Shop! ↩