Wayzata, MN to Everett, WA: 1,725 miles

Ever do something that at the time seems like a good idea but in retrospect seems crazy? That’s what we just spent the last two days doing. We decided to come home on I-94 instead of I-90 because we were hauling our new boat and it, combined with Mike’s monster of a truck, made for an almost 50′ long rig. Seemed too hard to try to see the sights while towing such a monster. So, we opted for the northern route since it was shorter by about 200 miles.

We left Saturday morning about 8:30 local time after having a too short visit with my grandmother and my aunt Gail. We hit the road determined to make it to at least Billings, MT and hopefully to Bozeman. Since we weren’t sure how far we’d get we didn’t try to make a hotel reservation… big mistake.

My folks say that it usually takes them about 14 hours to get to Bozeman. Well, not us. We made it to Billings in about 13 hours, but that was still 2 hours or so from Bozeman. But, since it was 8 something pm we decided to have dinner and then push on. We were back on the road about 9:30 pm and making good time. About Livingston we decided we’d had enough and stopped to get a motel room only to find the whole town booked out with no vacancy. Oh well. On to Bozeman.

We pushed on, getting into Bozeman about 11:45 pm. Turns out that there must have been something going on as we shortly discovered that every room from Livingston to Butte was booked. Faced with a post-midnight search for a campground / site or sleeping in the truck, we decided to sleep in the truck. We went to the rest area just off the city exit only to find that a lot of other people had the same idea. We got back on I-90 and went out to Belgrade. We tried a few more motels, but no one had any space. So, we cleared out the front and back seats (crew cab) and crashed out in the Albertson’s parking lot about 12:30 am.

Mike woke up about 6 am and decided to start driving. I slept until about 8:00 am in the backseat. We stopped for breakfast in Missoula and then pushed straight through to Everett stopping only for gas and pee breaks. It was a long way! Driving the truck in traffic with cross-winds is never at the top of my list, but doing so with another 25+ feet of boat trailer behind it? Crappy, crappy, crappy. But we made it with no mishaps and got home just before 6 pm.

So, we’re home a day early as we had intended to do the drive in 3 days not 2. But that’s okay as it gives us tomorrow to regroup, pick up the dogs, do some laundry and go for a ride on Lake Washington in our new boat. A very relaxing way to end our week. In the end, we logged just shy of 4,000 miles in 10 days. It took about 30 hours of driving time total each way. And I’m going to sign off now as I’m looking forward to sleeping in my own bed tonight. Night!