We are still in Washington State and will be for at least a few more weeks. More on that later. We really enjoyed our stay at Lake Roosevelt-Kettle Falls. Another nice setting and only $5 a day. Who could ask for more. One day when we were there we took a drive over to Grand Coulee Dam, which takes about 2 hours to get there. The 130 mile long lake was created by the Dam on the Columbia River, which was built from 1933 to 1942, This was one of Franklin D. Roosevelt's projects that created many jobs during the Depression of that time. It was built to create hydro-electric power and irrigation and is the largest electric power producing facility in the US. It is also one of the largest concrete structures in the world and is quite impressive.
We didn't take the tour like we did at Glen Canyon when we were at Lake Powell a number of years ago as we had Savannah with us but did check out the Visitor Center.
There were two power plants built in the 30's and a third in the 70's which greatly increased the energy production. 60% of the power produced is by the newer plant.
We continued on, with scenery changing from forest to wheat fields and back along the Lake.
We stopped at Fort Spokane, which was built in the 1880's, whose main function was to maintain a truce between settlers and the Native Americans in the area. They have living history programs with volunteers and staff showing what life was like. This was only on Sundays and so we just went into the visitor center which was interesting. The visitor center was in the former guard house, one of only 4 of the remaining fort buildings. When the fort was shut down, some of the buildings were used at an Indian boarding school and then a hospital. The other buildings were torn down and the wood, etc was given to people in the area for their own use, which was during the depression.
The flag in the picture above is at half staff as it was 9/11 and an interesting place to visit on a day when we remember those who lost their lives on that terrible day and those who helped saved many many more sometimes at the cost of their own lives.
As we continued on, we saw a few horses strolling down the roadway. Hope they found there way home.
On Thursday, the 13th, we head for Spokane, where we will visit with our long time friends, Dave and Silvia, who we reconnected with last year after many years. We will also visit with Joyce and Dennis. Joyce is a friend who worked with us many years ago and we haven't seen in over 25 years. They live in Post Falls, near Coeur d'Alene.
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