AUGUST 2020 MOTOCACHING TRIP - DAY 4

After no breakfast again this morning other than our snacks we backtracked up Hwy 135 and stopped at a cache I had unsuccessfully attempted the last time I was in the area several years ago. It had 23 Favorite points and having not found it did not put me in exclusive company. The coords took us to a Forest Service sign that was out in the open. We looked and looked and I was about to give up again when Clint snagged it. It was disguised as a bolt in the sign. If you pulled on the bolt it came out as a sleeve with the log rolled up in the sleeve.

Just a little farther up the road just beyond the little town of Paradise was one of my favorites. It was called “Spring Forth aka Paradise Water”. There is a gushing spring by the roadside that has provided clean cold fresh water for passersby for almost 100 years. The natural phenomenon all started when the railroad built the syphon when they separated Norman Hermes’s grandfather’s farm on the north from their water supply of Kennedy Creek on the south. A man was there when we arrived filling up containers. He said it was the best water in the world so we took him at his word and also tanked up. And it was very good despite the sign admonishing you to drink at your own risk.

After reaching Hwy 200 and riding west through Plains we stopped for a cache that had received 28 Favorite points called “Drill, Baby Drill”. It was a sheer cliff about 20’ high and we assumed there must be a hole drilled in it somewhere but we couldn’t find it. We hiked down to where we could get to the top of the cliff but couldn’t find anything up top either. So we climbed back down and suddenly Clint said, “There it is”. What he saw was a vertical 1/4” thick wire about two feet long. The color of the wire blended perfectly with the color of the rock. The cache container was attached to the end of the wire concealed in a hole drilled at a vertical angle in the cliff so that it couldn’t be seen.

We continued ridding on Hwy 200 crossing the beautiful Idaho Panhandle. There was lots of traffic all along this highway. We stopped at Clark Fork at a Travel Bug Hotel in a couple’s front yard. I had seen their handle (Rolling Oldies) on one or two of my caches before, and we picked up a Travel Bug there. This was another extremely well made cache with an incredible 60 Favorite points.

Continuing on across the Panhandle we stopped for a cache between Priest River and Newport called “The Mangy Moose” placed in 2009. It was basically an advertisement for what is now a defunct restaurant. It looked as if it had fairly recently closed, possibly a victim of COVID 19.

The Mangy Moose

At Sandpoint we had picked up Highway 2 which we left shortly after entering WA turning northwest on Highway 20. The rest of this day’s riding was the most enjoyable of the trip for me (with the possible exception of Hwy 12 up the Lochsa which is familiar territory). Now we were riding alongside the beautiful Pend Oreille River and the traffic had diminished considerably. We left the river turning west at Usk and the road only gets better – hills, curves and evergreen forest. We didn’t stop again until we were well down the road about 14 miles east of Colville at perhaps my favorite stop of the trip. This cache, the “WaStatePks100: Crystal Falls”, featured a beautiful waterfall with boulders strewn around to sit on and enjoy the view. We ate our lunch there and visited with a couple who arrived while we were there in their Mercedes mini-motorhome.

Our next stop was at Sherman Pass east of Republic. This cache featured some metal cutouts of wolves obscurely situated up the steep mountain side. Fortunately you didn’t have to climb up to the wolves to log the cache. It was a micro located on the sign at the roadside.

Wolves on mountain

Clint snags "Wolves" cache

Our last road stop was a little past Waconda and was an interesting but sad story. It was called “The Pflug Mansion”. John Pflug had a dream of building a lovely German style mansion for his growing family which he began in 1908. Money being tight, he hauled all the lumber himself from a sawmill about ten miles away and did all the work himself. Unfortunately he was never able to finish his dream house but the family lived for several years in a part that was finished. It has been vacant since 1921. There was a nice home about a quarter mile east of the old mansion and I wondered if it belonged to one of his descendants.

The Pflug Mansion

                                                                   

We checked into the Red Apple Motel in Tonasket late afternoon which turned out to be a nice place to stay. While Clint was relaxing I took a short hike down to the park for a cache. The prior logs said you needed to be tall to get this one. I did get it and my comment was, “I’m not tall but I can climb a tree”.

We ended our day with a little ride down to the other end of town for some delicious sandwiches and ice cream cones. On this most enjoyable day we covered 348 miles and picked up nine caches. (To be continued) M/W
 

P.S. The reason for the small print at beginning and ending is that Blogger has a mind of its own.