august 2009

" We waved goodbye to the Jeff Ririe's on August 1st, Alysha's Birthday. It makes us sad when family leaves. Having any of you visit makes us happy. I guess we are just too quiet most of the time. After our very hot July we had to hurry and water the garden in hopes that we could keep it alive for the rest of the summer. Dad had an endoscopy, they could not find any problems. That is good and bad news. I think by now we have given up on the regular Doctors.


Thursday the 6th, we packed up and left for our trip to Canada and Montana. The northwest is so beautiful in the summer time. We spent the first night in Bonners Ferry. It is a fun little town and they were having their summer celebration . The town was lively and full of people. The next day we headed for Canada via the Crowsnest pass.




Saturday we arrived in Waterton and celebrated Aunt Joanne's Birthday with a picnic at the end of the Lake. It was the perfect way to start our family reunion.

We settled in the Prince of Wales Hotel. It is sort of like staying in a museum. Here we are posing for pictures.

I had forgotten how small the rooms were, but they were very comfortable and we had a beautiful view of the Lake. Of course the wind blew all through the night and we went to sleep with the wind whistling around our windows. It was especially fun for me to remember back when I worked as a chamber maid, many many years ago. The most expensive room in those days rented for $80. Uncle Jim paid about $300 for each of our rooms way up on the 4th and 5th floors.

Here are a few pictures to help you remember Waterton, the falls, Cameron lake and of course the beautiful view of the Lake.





Monday we were on the road for our journey across Logan Pass. We traveled the Old Chief Highway to the Border.

Here are Jim and Arlene at the top of the pass.



Our Journey over the pass was very slow. We had to wait several times for construction. The crews were taking out old crumbling walls and replacing them with new stones. By the time we got to the bottom, Nicole who has a bad back was in a lot of pain.


We moved into the lovely home Jim had rented and settled down to visit, work on a little family history, play games and of course eat. Robert, Jim and Dad went on a Helicopter ride over Glacier park.




This was Grandpa's view. Is it any wonder that he had to use the barf bag?






This view makes me a little envious. I think a helicopter ride beats hiking up the mountain to see the glaciers and lakes.

All to soon it was time to leave, but we made some good memories and had fun talking about growing up on the farm.

In order to avoid the long waits on the pass we drove home by taking the road around the park.

Grandpa and I took a drive over to Welling. Robert divided up the land west of Grandpa Wildes house into 10 acre lots and sold them. I do not like change. I'm glad you took the good pictures that you did when we were in Canada last Rob. Any way this is the way it looks now.

Maybe the rain damped my view. I do like the fence.

Looks like they are changing thing inside. Joanne is making lots of changes to her house. It looks very nice. They plan on putting in a new kitchen after they finish a new deck on the front of the house.
Monday we drove down to Big Fork and met Brent, JoEllen, Ron and Afton. Afton had just had a new pace maker, and JoEllen has a bad back and is waiting until after her holidays to have back surgery. So we didn't do a lot of hiking and playing. We did take out a pontoon boat for a little cruise up the river and went to a play at the theater. It was nice to have some time to read and enjoy the wonderful weather. It was perfect. Dad and Uncle Ron worked on geneology

Uncle Ron just had surgery to remove cancer on his ear, hence the hat. Isn't it grand getting old. Maybe you should all start wearing this sort of hat in the hot sun to avoid some of the miseries of old age.
Here are the guys, the three Amigos, and their side kicks.

Here we are all together.
All too soon it was time to go home. We had a pleasant trip home but faced a lot of weeds and grass cutting when we arrived home. The seniors had a garden party planned for Friday so we keep busy.

Saturday the Bakes took us to see a neat Rock museum. Next time you 'out of towners' come we will have something new to see.



Well that about takes care of August. I promise Septembers blog will be short.

Love to all of you. Grandma