Wednesday, March 1st

Well you all know the old saying about March - In like a lion our like a lamb or vice versa.  Well from our day today, it will go one way in some parts of the country and the other in the rest. 
  We had breakfast in the hotel and were on the road by 7:30.  The traffic was light as we were on the north end of Salt Lake City, so we set the cruise control on 80 mph and cruised.  We made it through the balance of Utah, then Idaho and finally Montana.  The roads were mainly good, even through the mountain passes in Montana.  The exception was in the Monida pass where there was a lot of snow on the road sides and then just south of Shelby, Mt where we had snow falling and the roads were starting to get an accumulation.  The passing lane was pretty much snow covered, but I was still able to maintain 70 mph when I travelled out on to it.  I think it was the weight from all the stuff we pack around in the truck box, but traction was no problem today.
  When we got to the border, we faced the usual list of questions.  I prefaced my answers by telling the agent we were over on liquor because we were returning to Grande Prairie to deal with a medical emergency at home and planning to stay until April, we were unprepared to head home this early.  A nice young man, he wished us a good day and sent us on our way.  Our deportation went smoothly.  LOL
  When we pulled in to Lethbridge is was about 6 PM, so we decided to stay her for the night.  You can imagine our surprise to find our regular hotel with no available rooms and several other with no vacancy.  We finally got a room at one we had not previously tried and were fortunate as it has just been renovated.  We also found the reason for the no vacancy sign on many places, a shortage of chamber maids.  No one to clean the rooms, who would have thought.  I seem to recall Dave C who owned the Trumpeter saying one maid could do about a dozen rooms a day.
  After checking in we went to a BBQ place next door and had the ribs.  They were very nice, well not quite Tony Romas', but good and our waitress was very pleasant.  A nice end to the day.  Yes I left her a decent tip.  LOL