Monday, June 16th
Today was one of our shortest travel days yet. A quick trip from Spokane to the Bavarian Village of Leavenworth, WA. When planning our trip, Leavenworth had come up as a bit of an attraction in Washington. Nestled into the hills of the Cascades is a small town completely made up to look like a Bavarian town. I figured it was worth a stop on our trip to check it out.
The Route
Like most destinations, we had a couple of route options. The first, take I90 from Spokane then cut north and reach Leavenworth via Wenatchee, or take the more scenic route 2 the whole way.
While on many of our trips we tended to stick to the freeways to maximize travel time, and truck stop availability, on this trip we are really trying to take our time, and enjoy the scenery. So we opted for the scenic route.
In total we are looking at about 194 miles, and about 4 hours of drive time.
The Journey
After a short trip through downtown Spokane on I90, we got off on Route 2 for our journey. Unfortunately this stretch of 2 just outside of Spokane was full of round abouts. We ended up going through 3 of them. Normally I do not mind round-abouts, but they can be a bit tricky going through in the RV, so I usually end up taking up both lanes to make sure I have room.
A lot of this journey was flatlands through Washington farm country. As we neared the end of the route we started to encounter our first of the Cascade mountains. Things started to get hillier, and or gas milage suffered.
Route 2 took us across the Dry Falls Dam, a part of the Grand Coulee water reclamation project. Apparently the Grand Coulee dam itself across the Columbia river is a sight to see in itself, so we have that marked out our list of things to see in our future adventures.
We continued on Route 2 until we ran into the Columbia River, then we turned south. Fun fact, we actually, sorta, encountered the very start of the Columbia River in our adventures in Banff. The Columbia Icefield that we stopped at to walk on the Athabasca glacier feeds the tributaries that lead to the start of the Columbia river, so on this trip we will follow that river from its start, through to its end when it meets the Pacific Ocean.
We followed the Columbia river south to the Wenatchee area, passing many, many, many cherry orchards. The season is in full swing and there were lots of roadside fruit stands. Unfortunately, we could not find any that looked RV friendly until we were well past, so we will have to plan to get our cherries at the Pikes Place Market in Seattle.
We were briefly delayed just north of Wenatchee by a vehicle accident blocking the road.
We were only stopped for about 20 minutes, giving plenty of time for a quite restroom break. The Joys of having a motorhome!
Once we got going again, it was a quick 20 minute drive through the Wenatchee river valley to reach Leavenworth.
Leavenworth KOA Holiday
It was an easy drive to find the campground entrance, however, to reach the office you have to pretty much drive through the entire campground first. This was a long winding journey with many speed bumps. We got checked in fairly quickly, waiting a few minutes for an escort to our site, and continued… all the way back to the entrance where our site was. Without remembering it, we had booked a deluxe patio campsite, so we had a nice extra long, extra wide site with a concrete patio, furniture, a gas grill, and a fire put. Unfortunately the area is in a full fire ban, so we won’t be able to put that fire pit to use.
Trip Totals
Total Miles Today: 175
Fuel Used: 19.8 gallons
Day Average MPG: 8.8mpg
Trip Average MPG: 8.6
Trip Total Miles: 1822
Trip Total Fuel Used: 212g
Dinner In Leavenworth
Once we got camp setup and took the pups for a walk, we fired up the ebikes and took a short 1 mile ride right into town. There were lots of bike racks available, so we locked up the bikes and took a stroll through town, as well as through their riverfront park. After walking through the park, we went on the hunt for authentic Bavarian cuisine. We ended up at the Andreas Keller Restaurant.
Cat was on a quest for some German sausage, and I was looking for some schnitzel so we decided to split their sausage sampler, and a schnitzel. Some how Cat was not enticed by their large pretzel.
We wrapped up dinner with some apple strudel. This actually ended up being disappointing.
After eating a bit too much, we rolled our way out past the live accordionist, grabbed our bikes, and pedaled our way back to the campsite for the night.