Fragile wandering

Helped by my earplugs and my organized layers, I sleep sound and safe like a winter flower. It is a new day, Seattle is behind me, new adventures are awaiting for me in Cœur d’Alène (ID).

And as I am ridding the same dry road than two years ago on our way to Oregon, I fondly remember how amazed I felt in front of such a desert yellow stretch with no house nor any life. It was then so giant for my inexperienced heart in America. I think with a smile that I won’t be the same now that I have crossed Alaska and Yukon Territories. Yet… There is nothing for miles and miles! It is so gigantically breathtaking! Thus, before the fork of Yakima, I understand my first surprise even if this great scenery has a lot to envy to Northern landscapes.
I cross again the Cascades range – American this time and not Canadian – in order to get closer to the American Rockies and Plains. I cross many fog layers. I meet the same yellow scenery than in summer time, doesn’t it ever change? Does it get new shades with springs?
And then, and then, Columbia River takes my breath away once again, it rocks my whole world. Columbia River moves once again butterflies in my heart, it gets printed in my eyes forever. Columbia River here, in Vantage (WA), is so different from Oregon; drawn by a rough desert, and the sun reflects on its high plateaux’s snow. It is still so majestic though, it cuts the land so deeply. I don’t know who she is at that point, but I can tell, by the firework in my stomach, by the blaze in my heart, that I have already met her. That I know her from another day, another season.
After this new love at first sight for Columbia River, the scenery is flat and rainy; not completely desert nor utterly alive. Mostly boring to be honest.

And I enter Idaho State. I really meet it in Cœur d’Alène, little town along the lake, lighted for Christmas. Time for a tuna sandwich and some stamps, time for stretching my legs near the lake; I wonder why there are so many French name – Nez percé. Coeur d’Alène – so far West but on the other side of the Canadian border. And too impatient to see Hell Canyon, pushed by the early night, I leave. Although Hell Canyon won’t accept me; or more exactly, its dirt road, almost flooded and not even a road in the end, my GPS’s mean trick, takes over me as night is coming. I don’t want to get another Baker’s scare.
I therefore drive towards Sandpoint, cloudy anyway, almost completely dark; and I take shelter in the library to continue my traveling tales.

The night is cold, or at least the early morning. Enough to wake me up. The early bird is grey, I walk throughout town, get closer to the Lake Pend d’oreille (what is their deal with human anatomy! Nez Percé? Pend d’oreille?*) Looking at the bridge that I crossed yesterday, the bridge that cuts waters in half, I dream of crossing it again, in the daylight this time, followed by the metallic train’s snoring. Instead, I gaze at the hazy morning sun – the only of my day – running in my half of the lake, absolutely dry, with a very peculiar light.
Then, I ride my car again, a long day ahead of me. Landscapes run too quickly in my foggy and peaceful window. I am terribly focus so I wouldn’t forget anything but my memory fails me. Water sleeps on my right, looked upon by special green and fogy rocks. A strange car cemetery rises in the rock quarry, but a nice cemetery, rusty cars (and bus and vans) are smiling at us, the traveler and her living car. Then, I cross the river, fleetingly admired, ephemerally loved, somewhere in between Sandpoint and Bison National Range.

Then Montana welcomes me…