August 21-22, 2013 Washington

We left Priest lake and went into Washington State.

Welcome to Washington. A backwoods Barbie pink pickup at WalMart in Colville Wash.

Colville had this HUGE lumber facility. Logging is big in this part of the country. This giant crane moved back and forth on wheels or a track, the huge claw moved back and forth on the boom. It picked up enough logs to fill the back of a semi and stacked them up.  The bus at Grandview Motel and RV park in Kettle Falls on Lake Roosevelt. Lake Roosevelt is the lake behind Grand Coolie dam. The lake unfortunately covered up the falls where the native American's used to catch salmon.

I was motivated and slaved for hours to make this  giant lasagna for dinner with salads. Should feed us for a few days. Downtown Republic, Wash.

Kettle Crest is a trail on the crest of the Kettle mountains. At the pass there is metal wolf sculpture. Our next destination was a harvest host winery, Ester Bricques.  The owners, both being chemists in a past life chose the name because the esters are the aromas in the wines and the brix are the sugars. Their label are two grapevines dancing, the grapes are their hair. They have award winning, very good wines.

We parked the bus right in the vineyard.

On the way we stopped at the farmers market in Tonansket and picked up this pound of organic basil. 16 ups, I made pesto. We both love pesto. We arrived at the winery on the night of their weekly wine and music event.  John tasting with Steve, the band was kind of a jam of a couple bands who will be playing at the garlic festival this weekend. Steve and Linda our hosts.

Sunset on the vineyards.

Huge sunflower at the vineyard and  a couple beetles, the first had a 2 inch long body was firmly entrenched in our window. John chased it off with a knife. The other one has a one inch body and is nicely colored.