One of our reasons for #skipwinter1 was because Matthew had enrolled in a graduate program at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
So after staying a few days in South Dakota, the three best friends continued our trip through the Northwestern U.S. to cross the border into Canada.
Driving through the Great Plains at the end of October is a roll of the dice; cold weather and snow could close roads and shut down campgrounds at any moment, leaving us stranded. Indeed, in late October of 2017 a cold front came down from Central Canada and chased us West as we drove towards Vancouver.
Our next campground was in Missoula, Montana. Here is a picture of Jacoby with a Missoula sign!
Our campground had actually shut off the water and we had to siphon water into our holding tank. One of the reasons we stopped in Missoula was so that we could visit Glacier National Park, which was gorgeous!
On our way back from Glacier NP, we stopped to watch the sunset over Flathead Lake.
We celebrated our 29th anniversary watching Tom Brady at Buffalo Wild Wings, and then we kept heading West (as the frigid weather continued to chase us!). We drove through the state of Idaho and hopped out of the truck to take this beautiful picture near Couer d’ Alene Lake.
We crossed into Washington and spent a couple of days camping at a KOA in Ellensburg, WA. This allowed us to visit Mt Ranier National Park, where we took more great pictures in the National Park.
We left Ellensburg and headed to the Canadian border. We had all of Jacoby’s paperwork but we were still nervous that if our paperwork for Jacoby wasn’t in order, they might not let us cross over to see Matthew! As we pulled up to the border patrol, a bored-looking guard looked at us, and then I rolled down the back window and Jacoby stuck his head out.
The guard lit up when he saw Jacoby and said “What a good boy!!! I assume you have all his paperwork in order?” We said, “yes” and he let us through without even looking at it!
And we were off to see Matthew!
