Thursday June 26 & Friday June 27, 0mi/0km
The train arrived in Salt Lake City, and I took a quick Uber to the airport. Unfortunately, my 7am flight had been canceled due to lack of flight attendants, and I couldn’t wait another 24 hours for the next flight. So with my refund plus my “denied boarding” compensation, I rented a one-way car to Spokane airport.
I was on the road at 6am and had a nice scenic drive thru Northern Utah and Idaho. A quick stop at the Idaho potato museum was warranted, and it was just as quirky as I imagined.
The gift shop had a bunch of ridiculous t-shirts and other junk, and the cafe had potato-based cupcakes and ice cream which were interesting.
From there, I drove all day through Idaho, into Montana, and I stopped at the Costco in Missoula to pick up some bear spray.
The northern few hundred miles of this trail are in grizzly territory, so I will be hiking with the appropriate gear. I bought a fuel canister at REI, and then hit the road, heading west towards Spokane. I ended up camping at a nice free little camping area behind the 50,000 silver dollar Cafe. Breakfast there the next morning was typical greasy diner food which definitely hit the spot.
After a couple more hours of driving, I dropped off the rental car at the Spokane airport, grabbed some lunch, and then got on a local community shuttle bus from Spokane to Newport. I did some resupply shopping at the Safeway in Newport, checked into my motel, and then grabbed some dinner at a local pizza place. Pizza in the rural West is never that great, I’m always comparing to New York Pizza which is hard to beat. Tomorrow morning, I’m meeting a local guy I had connected with, who offered to give me a ride to the Northern Terminus, which is like a 3-hour drive, much of it on slow dirt roads. That’s amazingly generous of his time. I’m pretty excited for the Hot Springs Trail in Idaho, which mostly coincides with the Idaho Centennial Trail. I’m actually using the guidebook for the ICT, since it’s more comprehensive and also newer and more up to date.