The Emotions

My P48 trip was an emotional journey for me. The culmination of dreams and promises kept. The personification of Dr. Seuss' "Oh The Places You'll Go". 

I expected, and experienced, the emotions throughout the trip. However, with few exceptions, most of the journey was on unfamiliar terrain. Places we had talked of, experiences we had discussed, but for the most part, new places, novel undertakings. Bitter-sweet would be the best way to describe most of the trip.

I was not expecting this trip to be quite the same. Yes, we had both longed to add Alaska to our list of states visited, but we had talked of a cruise, venturing inland far enough to visit Scott and Bev in the suburbs of Anchorage and probably not a lot more. I had memories of places discussed, experiences to pursue.

This morning, as I rode north through 2/3 of our adopted home state, I was hit with the fact that each place had memories of US. Each a story, a mental image, an adventure undertaken. But these memories, instead of bitter-sweet bringing waves of tears, were eliciting smiles, flashbacks to great times spent with my best friend.

We had launched from the boat ramp at Banks numerous times, usually a shared experience with friends (Scott and Bev, Clint, IMR members, Mike) or relatives (our kids, Tom and Chris).

We had crossed the 45th parallel on every trip between Boise and Moscow (Idaho) where Brian and Jason went to college.

Each trip to points north included us falling in love all over again with Little Salmon Falls where we would stop and take pictures as if we had never seen it before, and reminisce about watching the steelhead swim and jump their way up through the torrents of cascading water with Mark and Dar

Regardless of how many times we saw it we would chuckle at the site of the Little Stick That Could, after all these years still strong enough to hold up this huge rock

I laugh when I remember shuttling to a trailhead at Rocky Bluff campground on the remnants of a road that Betty knew she was going to have to return on once she dropped Scott, Bev and I off. She was not liking the idea of traveling this overgrown path and was pleased as punch when we finally came out  on a paved road near the campground. She knew then she only needed to stay on that road to get back, and was feeling much better until she discovered that, although paved, that route descended through a long series of switchbacks with nary a guard rail, down the north wall of the Salmon River Canyon; a vertical distance of over a mile!

We often stopped on these north Idaho journeys and had a bite to eat at Hoots, marveling at the collection of owls that people had sent old Hootie from around the world, or rendezvousing with Jim and Judy on their brief trip to Idaho

North of Graingeville I came to the B&B we often thought of stopping at, but never did, just because it was so unique

Between Craigmont and Winchester was the stretch of highway where I was stopped for speeding when a police car traveling in the opposite direction turned his lights on and gestured for me to look behind me, there to find the radar car had been following me with full lights, for over five miles. The conversation that ensued had both Betty and Brian convinced we were going to be arrested and thrown in jail.

A little further north again the railroad trestles held us in awe as they went from barely over the road to high upon the ridge as the highway descended into the canyon, their symmetry holding us spellbound, wishing we had viewed this years earlier when the pufferbillies climbed slowly to distant destinations.

So many trips, so many side trips, both of us thirsting for the unusual, the adventurous, the unique experiences that we cherished as much as we cherished each other.