White Pelican

Life is a funny thing. Yesterday was such a craptastic day and I truly believe that it was one of the worst days ever but in the end it turned out to be a great day. The tow truck was almost 2hrs late so it finally got to me around 4pm. When they pulled up it was just a Toyota Tundra with a flat bed on the top and I thought "you have got to be kidding me...This is Montana". But I was glad to finally know that we were getting on the road!

Once the car was loaded we were off. I had told Shane about my day and about how I was didn't make it to Craters of the Moon. So we pulled off to plug Twin Falls into the GPS and he chose the route that took us right by Craters of the Moon! I was going to get there after all! Geico paid for 250mi of towing and Twin Falls was 266mi so I was paying for the extra 16mi myself which was fine because Billings, MT was just too far out of my way to even be considered as an option.
Shane was awesome. He was my private tour  guide through Montana and Idaho. He grew up in the area so he talked about the Grand Tetons (which we passed), The twin Buttes, The big Southern Butte, Potato farming in Idaho, and the lava fields we were driving through. He also pointed out Arco, ID because it was the first city in the world to be run off nuclear power.

It rained for the last half of the trip so when we were driving through the sage dessert you could smell all the sage...it smelled so good that I had the window down for a bit. Craters of the Moon was not as cool as I thought it would be. Very small and not at all what I would think the moon looks like. But it was good that we went because I would probably never get back there to see it.
We got into Twin Falls right around 10pm. Shane asked if I wanted dinner but all I wanted was to sleep so we dropped the car off at Mazda and he drove me over to the motel 6 for the night. I went to pay for the extra miles and he told me not to worry about it! YES! Saved me $64.00!!
Yesterday was an interesting day to say the least.

*I got to see my first WILD White Pelican in ID! They are my favorite!
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Today I slept in. It felt wonderful and if I was in OR today I would have been doing the same thing anyway. I have no intentions of leaving this room except if Mazda calls. I plan on catching up on Project Runway, ordering a pizza, job hunting, working on my photo book, looking over my budgets and working on my new route that will hopefully start tomorrow!
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My car was fixed by 11:30am! I quickly packed and ran out of the hotel before noon so I could get my money back on the second hotel night that I wasn't using. Luckily, that wasn't a problem and I went to get my car across the street. The guy said it was a few rusty wires and it was a quick fix once they found the source of the problem and now she was running like a champ! He also said that it wasn't a "Mazda only" fix and they guys in Yellowstone should have been able to fix it. Oh well, this is why I should learn to work on my own car!

I got in the car and on the road right at noon and drove 10hrs (I am SO glad I wasn't doing this whole trip in one day!) to Monmouth, OR to meet Greg. I got a little lost but that's because the GPS said his road doesn't exist and it was dark and raining. Plus I was, at this point, exhausted.

But I made it! And I am back on track time wise!