25 July - Tubing the Spokane River and Barbecue with the Fasslers

25 July
This morning we tubed the Spokane River.  Unfortunately we did not have a waterproof camera so we don't have many pictures, but we had a great time!  We met the company at the take-out point where we parked the truck.

This is at the take-out point, looking upstream.  We will navigate this white water right before we exit the river.

He showed us the spot where we should exit the river (above), then he drove us to the starting point.  We donned our personal flotation devices (PFD's) and carried our tubes down to the river.  Away we go!

We were on the water about two hours.  We navigates several mild white water areas and there was quite a bit of casual floating.  The water is crystal clear, water temps in the 60's and trout could be seen as the sun shined through the water to the rocky bottom.  

The river is crystal clear.  Trout thrive here.  

Things were going pretty good until we were just around the bend from the exit point.  There was a huge weeping willow tree overhanging the river with branches into the water.  Due to the current we were led right into it and got slightly tangled.  Our tubes were tethered together and the current caught my tube but Doreen's was still tangled.  Over I went!!  So I ended up out of my tube on the other side of the tree branches.  Doreen could not see me and she was about panicked!  I was trying to not lose my sun glasses and my hat!  So we finally got untangled and headed downstream.  We laughed for half an hour!!  It was a great time and we are glad we did it.

Later our good friend and Air Guard comrade Mike Fassler, one of his daughter Rachel and his son Peter came to the camp ground to check out our digs and barbecue.  Sherry and their other daughter Nora had a ball game tonight so they could not come.  I had fired up the grill and as he texted his 12 minutes out, I got the meat started.  We are as soon as they arrived and then the kids headed for the beach to swim.  Mike got the nickel tour of our RV and then we continued our conversations from our lunch the other day.  It was great to see the kids and spend some more time with Mike!

Tomorrow we expect to hear from Doreen's cousin as Amazon brings some packages to their house in Coeur d'Alene.  I ordered a few things since we have a house to send them to here.  They also ordered a cloud picture frame for her uncle Bob and aunt Phyllis and I volunteered to help configure it.  I think the plan is they will bring the boxes over to the campground so they can see our RV, and then in the next day or so I will configure the cloud frame and then hopefully Thursday we will take it over to the assisted living center where they live and get it working on their WiFi.