Helping Brenda in Post Falls, ID

Brenda and her Dad plant shrubs in the front yard.

Brenda is a busy gal, so Chuck and Eve decided to head out west to see if we could lend a hand getting her new house shaped up.  We spend a week there doing odd jobs around the house and a variety of fun activities.  Some of the jobs we did were, wash windows, plant some new shrubs, help organize the garage, mow the lawn, fix a couple of screens, fix a leaking toilet, fix a door latch and just general fun stuff.  Brenda was working every day, but we cooked out, ate out, geocached, took our day trip, attended her softball game, attended her Rotary luncheon, etc.  By the way, Brenda was the 2010 Rotarian of the Year in Coeur d'Alene and we are proud of her!  I also was able to cruise around town on Rachel's bike which is stored in Brenda's garage.  Every morning, I went for a short walk in the neighborhood and would pick a fresh bouquet of flowers from the vacant lots in the area. (No wonder my allergies were fussing all week.)

Side Trip to Priest Lake Area

Priest Lake in Northern Idaho

Our little 'vacation within a vacation' consisted of a day trip to Priest Lake, about 60 miles north of Post Falls.  We rented a car for the day and Eve and I headed north.  We had heard that this was a premier mountain and lake paradise of Idaho.  Much of the area is National Forest and Woodchuck was in his glory with trees and wild flowers in abundance.  We visited the cedar grove (next post), several spots along the lake, a US Forest Service museum, ate lunch at a resort along the lake, drove up the west side of the lake, the east side of the lake and made many stops along the way to look at and photograph wild flowers.  Perhaps Woodchuck will feature more posts in the future featuring some of the flowers.  On the way home, we stopped for supper at a restaurant at Old Town, ID on the border with Washington State with a view overlooking the snow melt-filled Ponderay River.

Saw the Cedars

300 year old western red cedars make up a remnant grove that survived a 1926 forest fire

One of the stops that was on our 'must see' list was the Hanna Grove of old growth cedars.  Even though this was in an area of ponderosa, white and lodgepole pine, it was a springy damp area and so was spared a devastating forest fire in 1926.  This was on a tract of land that a family by the name of Hanna had claimed, but when they saw the sized of the trees, they moved on to find a claim with less daunting-sized trees to use to build their cabin.  Some of these trees were 4 feet in diameter and over 100 feet tall.  Loggers were only interested in white pine at this time. 

Geocaching in Post Falls

Woodchuck demonstrates his gps technique as Brenda and John look on.

Some of our fun times in Post Falls were spent geocaching with Brenda and her friend, John.  There were oodles of caches right around their neighborhood and all over the city.  We found quite a few, but there were some real "stumpers".  Once, John sniffed one out that the rest of us had walked by.  Another that we had made a second trip to look for, old Woodchuck bungled into.  Some had to be chalked up to: "must have been muggled", "the coordinates must be off" and just plain "lets give this one up". 

Caching at the Hot Rod Cafe

One of the caches we found was at this "California Surfer" type cafe.

We found a cache on the shady boulevard alongside this unusual cafe in Post Falls.

A Walk In The Park

Eve, Me and Brenda along the Spokane River in Post Falls Photo by John.

On a beautiful Sunday afternoon, Brenda, John, Eve and I stopped by the Post Falls Pita Pit.  We picked up our pitas and headed for the Kiwanis Park on the Spokane River.  Sitting at a picnic table in the shade of magnificent aromatic pines we enjoyed our healthy and delicious lunch.  Then, gps's in hand, we strolled toward the river searching for 2 geocaches along the way.  No luck - "muggled", but it was great just being there together.