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Stacy's Birthday weekend trip- part 1

We decided to take a weekend trip for Stacy's birthday.
We talked and talked about where to go, we narrowed it down to three directions/locations/areas to see that could easily be explored in an overnight weekend trip. We had to work around the third person in our department already having the Friday, Stacy's birthday, off. We were in luck that it has been a slow last week and the department head let Stacy and me go a few hours early and flexing out some overtime. So we'd packed up the small amount of things needed for a short trip and just had to go home pack up the car and go. An hour after we'd left the office we were driving by it on our way out of town heading East.

We'd decided this trip would be to the Kalispel area of Montana, about 140 miles away. On the way out it was cold and overcast so I didn't take any photos on the way out. At the Montana border we lost an hour to the mountain time zone but it was still light at 9:00 pm long after we'd gotten to town and gotten to a motel.
We had dinner at a really great Mexican restaurant, Stacy did a little gambling at the Casino at the motel, gambling is legal in Montana so there are little hole in wall gambling places ALL OVER! And after a bit since I don't gamble, I went back to the room and watched Forensic Files on Tru-Tv and looked at all the travel info I'd gotten near the front desk.
The motel was an older one in town, I should have thought to ask on check in about the sound insulation between the rooms, but I didn't. I later wished I had! It had been a while since we'd been out to a motel and I'd forgotten about asking for an upstairs room. As I've mentioned in previous posts I can't sleep well, or at all, in a totally quiet room and most motels now have it to where you can run the fan from the A/C unit all night so I thought it wouldn't be a problem. Except since this was an older motel you couldn't run theirs unless you had the A/C on also. First indication of trouble was while I was in the bathroom and the guy in the next room turned on his shower, it could have been in our bathroom, it was like the shower was on right there it was so loud! Later we were ready to go to sleep except when I turned off the TV I then heard two other TV's going, one above us in that room and one I'm guessing, diagonally above us.
OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!
It was clear enough that I knew that that room was still watching the Forensic Files mini marathon! The guy in the room above us, and it was only one guy, thought now was a good time to thud around his room. He took a shower and used the toilet, that's how I know it was a guy! Then settled down on his creaky bed. I hoped that we wouldn't freeze and got the fan going or I knew I wouldn't get much sleep this night.
I was right to sleep and got about an hours sleep before the temp made it to the thermostat setting and shut off. Bing, instantly awake, I stayed that way drifting off until the guy above would turn over and his bed creaked, or a loud commercial came on the TV with the Forensic Files was still going. This went on till about 2 am when the TV's were finally off and it was dead quiet. I was in and out of a napping kind of sleep till about 3:30 am when other people started to wake up and take showers! I turned the thermostat down more and with the fan on I thought I might get some sleep before our day started. Didn't work though, again the temp got to the setting and fan was off and I was awake. I have a travel sound/white noise gadget I SHOULD have brought but didn't think I'd need since I had it before and didn't use it. I got about two hours of good sleep for the night.
So, our new day starts when Stacy woke up and wanted her coffee. My eyes felt like marshmallows all puffy. She got us some toast and stuff from the breakfast bar at the motel and we planned out our day. Anything Stacy wanted to do was fine with me and she wanted to check out some quilting stores, and there are quite a few in the area. One was right next door to the motel so that was the first stop. We drove around the area of Kalispel, we've been through but never to the town before. We found the quilters equivalent of Toys R Us and we were there for quite a while. We then drove up to Whitefish, Montana. We walked around all the shops and stayed the longest at a nice but very expensive art gallery there. Some really nice artwork but we don't have the budget for a $17,000 to $40,000.00 piece of artwork. If we ever win the lottery, well even then I'm not sure I'd want to spend that much for a painting!
The top photo and this one to the left were taken when we got up to Galcier Park. Only the West entrance and the visitors center were open this early in the year. The ranger at the entrance at the main gate said they'd had more snow this winter than in the last few years combined. There was still snow everywhere and all the stores and cabins and camping areas were all still closed and boarded up. The "Going to the Sun" road was open for eleven miles so after the Apgar Visitor's center we headed out on the road. We could go as far as the Lake McDonald Lodge were the road was closed and only bicyclist could go farther. Driving through the area was almost no traffic so it was a nice and comfortable paced drive. When we got to the lodge that we found out was where everyone was. Almost no parking there and nothing is even open there yet! We can imagine how packed it will be in about two months!
This photo is from a pullout on the way to the lodge. Looking Northerly up Lake McDonald.












Stacy drove on the way back to Kalispel so I could look around and we stopped and took some pictures along the way. While it was cool it was comfortable even with the top down and the heater on. We finally got some photos of the Solstice with the top down!
More of the trip in part 2!
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