Kootenai Country: The road trip begins

It's been a long summer and I was more than ready to go on my much anticipated road trip. As been on my past road trips, fall is the time to do some national parks and tour the western states.  Yesterday, after hugging my cat goodbye, I drove to my parents' house to pick up my sister who would be joining me on this road trip.  This is a first, considering all my previous road trips were solo affairs.  It will be nice to have someone to share adventures with this time around.  We proceeded to Spokane, WA, where we spent the night.

Yesterday, the weather was mostly on and off drizzles, but today brought scattered clouds, blue skies and sunshine.  We headed north on US 2 to Bonners Ferry, ID, where we visited Kootenai National Wildlife Refuge.  It was here that I hoped to see some waterfowl, but most of the refuge was disappointingly devoid of water...and birds for that matter.  Most of what I did see was too far away from the road to see very well.  But, I got a photo of a dragonfly and we had a nice lunch in the sunshine.

We had much better luck as we headed east, crossing into Montana and pulling off at a well-marked wayside between the towns of Troy and Libby.  We were there specifically to see Kootenai Falls and walk on the Swinging Bridge.  A dirt trail took us down to the Koonenai River, where we decided to see the falls first.  It wasn't as impressive compared to many falls I've seen, but there was a lot of water flowing so it was still quite picturesque.

With such churning water, it was no surprise to see quite a few kayakers challenging themselves in the river.  In the calm shallows, I spotted an American dipper looking for a snack in the water.

Before leaving the river, we hiked downstream to see the Swinging Bridge.  Walking on it, I can attest that it DOES bounce, but it wasn't really swinging.  Perhaps you have to help it along, but I certainly didn't feel like experiencing that.

I'm really looking forward to tomorrow.  We'll be visiting Glacier National Park...a place I haven't been since I was a teenager.  I really don't remember it much, although I've been told it was very rainy that time.  Stay tuned for hopefully some pretty awesome pics!