Country as in countryside as opposed to country as in nation. After all of our fun country (nations) exploration we find ourselves in Ellensburg, Washington. Population: 20,000. I suspect they were counting college students when that number was arrived at. We are incredibly grateful for having a place to stay, a comfortable home to isolate in, my awesome Cousin and Her Husband who put up with us, two doggies to give attention to. But, Ellensburg is the place you stop to grab something to eat while driving from the west side to Spokane! People live here? I thought there was just some restaurants on Canyon Road.
Seriously though, it is a nice town. Central Washington University is located here, which means there’s good pizza. Iron Horse Brewery is here – if you like Irish Death or Mocha Death beer this is where it’s from (I could walk to the brewery in about 10 minutes from the house). The town has some cuteness and like many smaller towns there are quirky places! We have been here a couple of other times for which I am glad. Good to know it is normally fairly lively – like everywhere else it’s super quiet these days. On the day that the sale of our house closed we headed here for a few days. We needed to be nowhere near the valley for a little bit. That was a tough time.
The situation facing the entire world is unprecedented. I honestly hope that it’s the only time a situation like this is experienced. And I pray that we all come out the other side with a better understanding and appreciation for ourselves, our families, our jobs (provided you still have one) and the world around us. People are different. Respect that.
Sermon complete.
Last Saturday the Husband and I went for a long walk and on Sunday we went for a drive. Our walk was from the Cousin’s neighborhood, out through the downtown area, past the university and down the Vantage Highway for a little while. Sounds pretty lengthy huh? It was about 4 miles. Yeah.
Ellensburg is just west of the Columbia River. Whenever we crossed the state (and it was fairly often when the younger of our two boys was in Spokane attending Gonzaga for four years) I would always mention that I wanted to explore the Vantage area. Vantage is on the west side of the Columbia, right where the bridge is. So, last Sunday we headed out the Vantage Highway, which runs parallel to I-90 towards Vantage. It took us about 30 seconds to explore Vantage. A) everything is closed, B) it would have taken 45 seconds if anything had been open. The bummer was that the park at the base of the bridge was closed too! WHAAA!! We were able to take a few photos from up above but it wasn’t the same. Bummer. After our foray in Vantage we continued on the highway. It went over I-90 and then headed south along the river. There were a few places where there was no guardrail and the road got a bit curvy…the Husband was driving and informed him that he could drive, or he could sight see, but he could not do both!
