Northern Idaho at 105
Neither Sal or I had ever been to Orofino or around the Clearwater River. We arrived there on a Friday afternoon – a nice small community right along the beautiful Clearwater. The river certainly gives what the name insinuates. It is as clear as glass. Even in the deep areas you can see the bottom. The river was wide and clear and seemed to be at a very good level.
Orofino is a nice small Idaho town. The people were very friendly and very laid back. No hurry. no scurrying around – just laid back and let it be type of attitude. That – we found – even included doing business.
We found a great hotel right downtown to spend a couple of days. The hotel is an original in Orofino and has been recently remodeled into suites. It was lovely, centrally located and convenient for our stay. We loved the elevator – it must have been circa 1920 – just barely could fit a luggage cart and both of us. You had to close the iron gate and then be sure and close it again when you got out or the elevator wouldn’t answer the call button!.
Since the business associates we wanted to see were apparently not working again until Monday – we thought we should take a little tour of the area. We drove to Dworshak dam – just north of Orofino to find the lake full to the brim with clear blue water – it was gorgeous.
Full to the Brim
The view from the dam was also very lovely – the Clearwater area is very steep with deep ravines. This photo shows a great example of the area –
From the Dworshak viewing area
The cutest story I have from this area is our golfing experience. I called out Satuday afternoon to the local Orofino Golf and Country Club nine hole course to see if we could get on at 7:00 Sunday morning. The young woman who answered said “well we don’t open until 8:00 but we will leave the keys in a cart for you and you can just pay when you get done.” Now that is small town trust – something we just don’t find all that often. And we did – we played our nine holes and then paid when we were done along with a nice burger and fries for lunch!
We did find these two friends on the course and this photo also shows you how very dry the area around the course was.
Friends at the Country Club
We decided to leave this area on Monday morning – it was beautiful in its own way but the temperature had been in the triple digits for three days and we had seen enough – so onward into the north!
Leave a Reply