Road Trip to Oregon 2008 - Part II: Chicago to Cove, OR

Friday, June 13

As the time to leave Chicago approached, we found out that the train service was interrupted by flooding, most notably in Wisconsin. We were all boarded onto 5 buses for the roughly 8-hour drive to Minneapolis. We were one of the last buses to leave Chicago, but that turned out to be a good thing. Most of the other buses ran into water or heavy traffic on the roads and were stuck. We managed to edge around the water and get to the Minneapolis train station first around midnight. We were loaded onto the train right away and ended up waiting for more than four hours for the other buses. At least, I managed to sleep through most of the wait.

Saturday, June 14

The train ride across the top part of the country was very scenic...and long. I was lucky, though, and had my row of seats to myself. The train made a lot of quick stops along the way, picking up and dropping off people.

Sunday, June 15

I awoke somewhere near Sandpoint, ID around sunrise. I looked out the window of the train and was startled to see we were passing through a beautiful lake in the mountains. What startled me about that was the fact I couldn't see the track so it looked like we were floating across the lake. It was one of the most beautiful sights of the trip and I was glad I woke up for it. About the time we reached Spokane, WA, I called he Dad to see where he was. He and my brother were already on their way to Pasco. At this point, I turned on my GPSr for maps and ETA information. Sometime around 10am, the train arrived in Pasco, WA. We were roughly 4 hours late.

I had maps of the caches for the trip home, but since my brother was along and it was Father's Day, we didn't make too many stops. We stopped at a Home Depot in Kennewick, WA and I hunted a cache next door - FBC by tumbleweed2 (GC1A0DA). We stopped in Pendleton, OR for lunch at Burger King and I logged a cache that was 144 feet away from where we parked - Lame Micro, King's Sinkhole by WR7X (GCZHDC). Two hours later and we were in Cove, OR at my mother's house where I would be staying for the next month.