Hope

Thursday, July 22.  We woke up to raindrops again this morning, but it finally cleared off a little.  We got some bad news from back home in Indiana, the grandson of one of my dearest friends died, and we were very sad to hear that.  My friend Barbara, who is one of my very best, lifelong, most wonderful friends and I've know her since first grade (I know she is reading this) tracked me down again with this news, and I really appreciate how she keeps me informed.  However, I wish she would relay some good news to me when I'm traveling!  Our hearts go out to Mike and Donna in the loss of their grandson.

We changed campgrounds to one in the national forest called Porcupine Campground (we never saw any porcupines, though.)  Collins thought Dave's Dodge could no longer do the job, so he is backing up his Saturn Vue to hook up the Johnsons' Silver Streak so we can move.

It was good to have the Brundiges back.  I think.  Here's out campsite in the woods.  Lots of mosquitos, but we have a view of the Cook Inlet behind us.

Anyhow, we got moved and then Joe took us "old women" out to the creek to go gold panning. In yesterday's travels, we met a woman named Dovie at a gold panning/gift shop/tackle shop who had staked a claim in the Coeur d'Alene Campground here, and she gave us permission to pan on her claim.  So I have a slip of paper with permission for the "Froeschke party" to pan.  It was a beautiful drive back to this campground (it was for tent camping, so we didn't move to this one), and we found a place to get in the water.

It was fun panning, and we thought we found some gold dust, and maybe a couple very small flecks of gold, but we finally gave up and headed back.  The road back to this campground had beautiful views of the tundra-covered mountains.

On our drive back, we had a nice view of the Cook Inlet

While we were off goldpanning, Collins had gone fishing, and he brought back two salmon (pinks) for dinner.  David gave him a lesson in fileting fish, but he needs more practice!  Marilyn cooked up a fine dinner for all of us (spare ribs and all the salmon you could eat).