Wallace, ID

If anybody is following our route, this may be confusing.  Leaving Coeur D'Alene, which is almost at the western border of Idaho, we drove to the state line on the eastern side.  Of course in this narrow part of Idaho, that's only 67 miles.  One of the WINs found an excellent place for us to park.  It's at exit 0 of I 90, which is actually a Montana exit number.  Lookout Pass is a ski area, but in the summer they run buses for the Hiawatha Bike Trail.  More on that in a future blog.

They (claimed) that they were happy to have us there for a week and we gave them a contribution for their free children's ski school in thanks.  The parking area is huge and available for free RV parking.

One day we visited historic Wallace, Idaho.

If you want to read the fascinating story, you can click on the following sign, but here's the short version.  When the interstate (I 90) was planned to go right through tiny Wallace, the whole town was put on the National Register of Historic Places to prevent this from happening.

Instead, the interstate was built as a raised roadway.

Now I would usually think, "Wow!  What a waste of money!"  But in this case I really think it was justified.  Wallace is squeezed in between mountains to the north and south and the interstate really would have taken out the whole town.

The cute railroad depot was moved to a safe location and houses a railroad museum.

While wandering around town, our friend Dan met a buddy.

I believe this is the only place I've seen one of these.

The girls were seductively posed around the lobby.

As well as luring customers upstairs.

We also toured a silver mine, for which this area is known.  But that will be the next post.