Endless fields of yellow flowers are the most prominent feature of the eastern Montana landscape. All the way across the state on US-212, from I-90 eastward, featured miles upon miles of bright colors.

The Milky Way. A 90 second exposure.

Very early dawn in Nebraska. Above this house: a noctilucent cloud – one of the rarest kinds to see!

Slightly later dawn.

Nothing to see here, just a train carrying airplane fuselages.

A state-named I-90 sign which I managed to miss during my previous trip through here, in December, 2007. It’s in Laurel, about two blocks off the main drag.

Not particularly old signs, but definitely an old gantry. At one point, this mentioned US-10 for sure.

I do not know why this Montana 3 sign has an extra thick border. Also, why it does not point to 3 in any reasonably direct manner. It instead points to US-87. Since US-87 and MT-3 both connect Billings to Great Falls, it may very well be the cast that what is currently 87 was once 3.

Typical eastern Montana grasslands scene.

Close-up of the typical eastern Montana grasslands scene.

A different style of flower.

A strangely compelling era of Montana history comes to an end. I remember seeing, in 2005, an older-style US-47 shield here, and then was quite shocked when, in December 2007, I noted that they had replaced it with a shiny new … US-47 marker.

now, finally, state route 47 is correctly marked heading out of Hardin. a small part of us has died.

Infinite regression of purple flowers.

absurdly large dandelion. Seriously, it was about 4 inches in diameter.

This is the only example we found of a signed Indian Route. It uses the same route marker as the Montana state secondary highways – but a completely different range of numbers. The secondaries start around 270 or so.

US-212 in eastern Montana is the Warrior Trail.

This sign is neither embossed steel, nor cast iron. It is wood – and the parts not protected by black paint have weathered away over the last, oh let’s say 40 years.

in any case, the state of Montana wants you to know that if you want some heaps of dirt, you’ll just have to get your own.

We are now in Belle Fourche, South Dakota. And no – despite being 16×16 inches – these are not direct replacements for 16″ cutout US route markers. They’re just … oddly lame.

An original 1958-specification Business Loop 90 marker. It may very well be the only one in South Dakota.

An abysmally bad photo of the sunset. I took this one while discovering that a particular set of ramps on I-90 didn’t have anything to the north but the on- and off-ramps – so I was hastily beating a U-turn (probably quite illegally) before the cavalry came.

Lots of old signs to be found in the Black Hills. I need to return here sometime during the day. Perhaps in early October, to take photos of the leaves changing, and various other general-interest topics.

An oddly shaped 385.

A classic one, unfortunately hidden behind a pair of street blades. I’ll bet that, if I told you that it was in the town of Lead, that you could find exactly where.

Whoops, that’s supposed to be state route 87.

Nebraska. We drove through the night and we’re in about the middle of the state by dawn.

Foggy morning.

Another sunrise photo, through the fog and the trees.

Alas, not the original white town boundary sign.

An older Junction assembly. One can tell its age by the smaller numbers in the route markers – and, oh yeah, the general decrepitude.

What strange installations lurk in the fog?

Agricultural vehicle is agricultural.

An older faded sign.

There isn’t much button copy left in Nebraska. Most of it is here on the 129 freeway.

US-75 was moved from Iowa into Nebraska in the mid-1990s. Therefore, some signs needed to get patched.

One last set of flowers. This is in Iowa – where we will leave off for now. Next up: Missouri River flooding in Iowa, lightning storms in Kansas!

Squeezing in the last of morning light.

This sign might very well date back to when US-12 in Wyoming was renumbered to US-212 in 1963! There are very few US-212 shields in Wyoming.

About 9500 feet up the pass. This view is in infrared, which causes ice to show up bright blue.

A marmot appears.

A very ordinary view from a very famous location. The trees have grown some, obscuring the river, but the old routing of US-191 from where the photo was taken is still accessible – it is, in fact, a parking lot for a specifically designed viewpoint. Alas, we did not get the sort of spectacular clouds of that one day in 1942.

Did not actually happen.

Heading north towards Yellowstone.

Some geese on Lake Yellowstone.

We’re now heading out of Yellowstone on US-212.

Supercow is looking directly at us.

A yellow flower.

It is July, and this waterfall is still half-frozen.

The first 212 shield. It’s officially not signed in the park … but this one is a couple hundred feet shy of the exit. And yes, it’s a cutout.

This stop sign has seen less-decrepit days.

Looking back west towards Yellowstone on 212.

Same basic view, different set of frequencies.

Close-up of Mount Pointy. That’s probably not its real name.

Deceptive photo. The implication is that those mountains are on US-212 heading east. They’re not – the sign is at the north end of the Chief Joseph Highway in Wyoming, and it just so happens to line up with the mountains to the west. (Not to fear, the mountains to the east are equally impressive.)

The Chief Joseph Highway heads off into the distance.

I do not know which waterfall this is.

We’ve reached the snow line, and Yellowstone is now just a distant point on the horizon.

Iridescent clouds.

Not a lot of snow or anything.

Half-frozen lake.

Yep, typical July weather in Beartooth Pass.

Raise periscope!

The view from about 10,300 feet. We are almost at eye level with those distant peaks.

The road winds its way past the glaciers.

The Bear’s Tooth is precisely the peak you would expect it to be in this picture. This is the top of the pass: 10,947 feet.

There is a good reason why the pass didn’t open until June 7th.

A multicolored frozen lake.

Wind-blown snow on the peaks.

We’ve made it to Montana. The state line is at about 10,700 feet – just below the summit.

This sign is positively ancient. It’s at the Montana state line – the first sign heading into Wyoming.

The Montana side of the pass has significantly less snow.

These blue flowers manage to grow at this altitude.

The Yellowstone River canyon.

non-people creature eats people food.

A good place to finish. The only sign of this style we saw in Montana.

Next up, we head east on 212, across most of the width of Montana and into South Dakota.

Old US-10 bridge at dawn. Glendive, Montana. The bridge dates back to 1922 and is no longer in service.

Now here are some old signs! Painted directly onto the side of a bridge – go ahead and try to steal them! They’re in Miles City. Some of the oldest highway shields in existence. The bottom one is ROUTE/22/MONTANA, which is Montana highway 59′s old number.

And here’s the very last of Montana at the end of the day.

We start where we left off the last time: Miles City, somewhere in the dead of night. I didn’t get any sleep that night, so I just chose an arbitrary cutoff between one day and the next. Here is a state-named I-94 shield from 1985. The very first one we find. There will be more after daybreak.

The first set of 94 shields we find with small numbers. These aren’t quite ’61 specs (the red crown was larger in the originals) but they sure are old. The gantry dates back to 1982 and is on old US-10.

At one point, this was Business Loop 94, but even that idea has been long forgotten. This is an original 1958-spec business loop marker.

Nice older state route 200S shield to go with the business loop.

Heading west on I-94 at dawn.

Why, that doesn’t sound good at all!

A different old bridge. This clearance warning may very well date back to when the bridge was built in the 1920s or 30s. As the road was repaved several times, the clearance shrank appropriately.

There are plenty of old I-94 shields if you know where to look.

In case you missed it the first time, the message appears twice.

On the other side of the bridge as the old shields. This guide sign has definitely seen better days: the second line says “10-12-LEFT”.

Miles City’s very strange take on what a business loop shield should look like. There are several of them on the downtown truck route. At some point, this was Truck US-10/12 but now it is I-94… yet they missed the memo on the updated color scheme.

Free car. Some maintenance recommended.

Ahem, US-39? Montana has a bad habit of mixing up its state and US routes, and this leads to signs for US-39 and US-47 in the field, despite the fact that such routes never existed.

This is not a particularly old electrical box. But it is still signed for US-10.

A 1980s shield made to 1970 specs, but the use of the white “TO” and banner was made obsolete in 1961.

Another old US-10 bridge. Most of old 10 is drivable – though some of it has had I-94 built directly on top of it!

A red-tailed hawk taking off.

US-10 parallels the railroad tracks.

Research shows that this is a product of the Spotted Ass ranch.

Extra-old Montana shield with the thick border.

Back in Billings. Here is an old Business I-90 shield, with a somewhat newer “east” banner.

Old I-90 shield, with a green arrow.

And here’s the US-47. Somewhere, I have a photo of this very same gantry from 2005. That one had a 1961-spec (narrow numbers) US-47 on it. When it came time to replace the sign, they replaced it with the exact same error!

This I-90 shield has seen better days. Vinyl numbers go on … vinyl numbers come off.

Getting towards sunset.

Looking back at Montana, from about two feet inside Wyoming.

Some sort of power plant in Wyoming. Note the fog along the ground. It’s two degrees outside – I have no idea what property of the atmosphere would cause normally rising gases to sink in cold air.

Seasonally appropriate signage.

and that’s it for Montana. Next up: Wyoming, Colorado, and then – noticing the imminence of an old-fashioned Rocky Mountain snowstorm… east to Kansas and Nebraska to wait it out.

old US-91 in Idaho. Between the full moon and the snow, it was bright enough to drive without headlights!

Interstate Ninety. Appropriately, I’m doing ninety. The storm behind on top of me, threatening wind and rain and snow, is doing ninety as well. This oughta be fun, especially since I am obligated to stop at every exit to look for old signs…

Snowfall in the canyons along old 91. Somewhere around McCammon if I recall correctly.

Dawn. Snowplows hard at work. We’re now on US-93, having crossed from US-91 on US-26 in the middle of the night.

Did I mention we’re crossing the Rockies in winter?

Approaching the mountain pass. Yep, it is totally snowed over.

Lost Trails Pass, 1945? Nope, I just did something badly wrong with a layer in Photoshop and I liked the result. Looks like some dodgy old film photo!

Our first Montana sign. We’re not even in Montana yet!

There we go.

Montana has reasonable speed limits. This is for a winding two-lane mountain road!

All highway signs buried under six feet of snow, for your convenience.

It is recommended that you do not exceed 25… but we won’t cite you for anything under 70 90.

What’s this, the skies clear up?

A house on the hill.

An old US-93 alignment yields this truss bridge.

And here, as promised, is Inflatable Biker Santa!

What’s this about old US-10? Someone never got the memo that the road isn’t called that anymore. There are a bunch of very recent US-10 signs at the Missoula airport.

Interstate shields with the state name are uncommon in Montana. They’d be rare if the state bothered to take down the old signs, but they don’t. Here is one in Missoula. This gantry dates back to 1975. Gotta love the state name … with the missing letter and a half!

Somewhat old signs in Missoula. Note the custom Montana font – especially noticeable on the “S” in BUSINESS.

Back on I-90, and the snowstorm is here. We’ll be racing it for at least a hundred miles.

If we bear down and head east, we can outrun it.

This is not a night shot – this is what happens when I fudge up the camera settings because I’ve turned back west, into the teeth of a raging gale, and I have about three seconds to take this picture before I am swept off the road.

Oh deer.

Somewhere in there, the sun has set on us. That bright object straight ahead to the east is the moon rising.

Auto-focus fail. Too bad, because this was a great 1960s US-287 shield, complete with rare Series A font. When I went back to find it in December, 2009, it had been replaced. The shield likely dated back to 1965, when US-287 was extended northward from Yellowstone.

A transitional style – wider fonts, but still keeping the square shield. 1970s.

Old US-10 heading to the moon.

Here is a nice 90 shield that time has forgotten. It is a 36×36 example (most of the ones we have seen are 24×24) – meaning it was once intended to be posted on the freeway itself. Instead, it was placed at a junction, and therefore will likely survive a lot longer than the mainline example I posted above.

Merry Christmas from US-10 in Bozeman.

US-10 is long gone, but its branch route, US-310, remains – and, in fact, begins here, branching off from old, unsigned US-10. Don’t mind the interstate shield with no state name – pay attention instead to the secondary route with the arrowhead design. I have no idea why Montana doesn’t use the cool arrowhead for its primary state routes, and the boring square for the secondary ones.

This classic 1961-spec US-310 shield is still around. Note the “west” banner. US-310 is north-south but here it happens to be running west for a few blocks before it terminates, though it came north from Wyoming.

Business 90 in Billings. Dig the small numbers – someone put 7″ digits on this shield where 8″ would be the 1958 standard. Here is where I-94 branches off I-90, and heads as far east as Windsor, Ontario Detroit, Michigan. We will next follow I-94… all the way to the North Dakota border, just so in daylight we can retrace our path and head back west on old US-10.

next up: I-94 and old US-10 in the eastern half of Montana, with perhaps a photo of North Dakota or two… and then, down to Wyoming and Colorado.

What do we have here? An original I-90 trailblazer, complete with green sign back. We found a few of these in Spokane, and several modern copies with the old-style shield.

Someone made this gantry, with correct distances and accurate 1930s Washington style, for his own front yard.

Sunset in Idaho.

This may very well be the oldest sign in Washington. The 97 covers up an outline shield! It does not reflect very well after about 52 years of service.

I have no idea what is under the greenout.

The 97C shield is a patch – and no, I have no idea what is under that either.

The Crowsnest Trail gets gets its own distinct route marker. That’s a patch too – underneath it is an ordinary 3 shield.

And we’re back in the US. Here is the beginning of US-97, with the very first marker. The border patrol gave us the whole nine yards. Apparently, wanting to return to the US to catch a flight out of Seattle is, in some way, highly suspicious. Nobody drives the Alaska Highway! Ever! [Dan photo.]

This isn’t an old sign, but the style – with the pointed directionals with city names inside – is reminiscent of what Washington did from the 1920s to the 60s or so.

An older ALT 97 shield with the classic shield shape, and the period after ALT.

The highway 150 bridge over the Columbia River in Washington.

Heading north on highway 17. The sign is barely legible, but the photo is in perfect focus. See the full-sized photo for how much the road was shimmering from the heat.

Everyone’s favorite town name. At least, it was Dan’s.

Another old 90 trailblazer, which is in slightly better shape.

Bicycle shields of Spokane, showing all the major routes through there.

This sign, complete with somewhat goofy-looking mix of 1958 and 1961 specs on the I-90 shield, also dates back to the opening of the route.

How long ago was the Maple St. Bridge tolled? Long enough that Washington still hadn’t started using button copy (mid-1960s), and the toll was a whopping 10 cents.

Ominous (but ultimately harmless) clouds over US-2 as we head northeast out of Spokane into Idaho.

A deer, by the side of an old US-2 alignment.

Almost in Idaho on US-2.

More overhead virga, but no actual rain.

We sure arrived at the wrong time of day to take photos of this old gantry at the Idaho/Washington state line. Note the black outline on the route 2. The gantry is of Idaho origin, except the state line sign was provided by Washington. Also, note in the background the green and white outline shield on the State Ave. street blade. I only spotted that when reviewing the photos – and that is not something I’ve ever seen anywhere else! [Dan photo.]

The second US-2 reassurance gantry has both the Panhandle and Selkirk route markers, as well as the Idaho scenic brown shield.

Getting near the end of sunset.

Trees to the south.

A perfectly reflecting lake behind this little tree.

The view to the north.

Sandpoint features several of these old green signs all down the main drag.

Some signs reflect better than others.

Several route 200 shields are the wide variety, but they are uncommon. [Dan photo.]

An awful photo of two signs that have lost nearly all reflectivity.

Idaho experimented with some retroreflective-background button copy signs in the 1980s.

Look at that, we’re in Montana. We were on the trail of a rumored cutout US-2 marker. We found no such thing, unfortunately.

End of route 200. We were in Montana only briefly, and cut across from 2 to 200 on state highway 56. 200 runs for over 1358 miles with a single number, running into US-2 again just west of Duluth, MN. It was given the number in the 1969. Washington route 20 was almost numbered 200 as well, but it would have split off from US-2 after a multiplex long enough that it was given a separate number. [Dan photo.]

95 does not enter Washington – and even when it did, it was for only a mile or so – but there are trailblazers for it in several places in the state. [Dan photo.]

A very thin-stroke variant of Series B, that looks pretty close to Series A, on numbers 27 and 272.

This 1960s I-90 shield survives. It may be the last 21×18 shield in Washington. [Dan photo.]

These 1960s green signs can be found at a lot of interchanges with I-90 in the Snoqualmie Pass area.

And we’re back in Seattle. Most of these green signs with both 5 and 90 on them were replaced when the Mariners got their new stadium, but a few survive.

Washington’s always liked putting their interstate shields on white squares.

This shield is old enough to have a black scotchlite (black, but retroreflects white) arrow under it. It goes back to the 1960s.

A City of Seattle sign – note the upside down letter “S”. Oh, and yes, the speed limit is six. You don’t see that very often.

Excellent old button copy in Tacoma.

An attention-getting speed limit sign made up of LEDs. [Dan photo.]

I don’t think the street where this sign is found is actually state route 7 anymore.

Tacoma’s main drag.

Getting close to the airport because we’ve got a flight to catch.

And that’s the end. About a tenth of a mile before the rental car return. Over 6500 miles in 7 days of driving.

We resumed our journey along Idaho 13 north to U.S. 12 east for the eastward trek into Montana. U.S. 12 is considered a scenic route throughout its routing in Idaho, so signs are all coloured brown (shades of the old Florida days, I tell you!). The road lives up to its scenic designation, paralleling the Lochsa River from Lowell east to McConell Mountain and Lolo Pass. Surprisingly, the road moves fast and passing opportunities are available more than you would think.

Westbound reassurance shield for U.S. 12 posted at the settlement of Lowell. The Lochsa River flows into the Clearwater Middle Fork river at Lowell. U.S. 12 parallels the waterway west to Kooskia and Kamiah.

 

At the Montana state line, which occurs at Lolo Pass (elevation 5,235 feet) is the Lolo Pass Visitor Center and Lewis and Clark Interpretive exhibit. The facility doubles as a welcome center for both states, and we were able to obtain official state maps for both Idaho and Montana there. Once U.S. 12 enters Montana, the road straightens somewhere and a generous 70 mph speed limit ensues. Much to my surprise, we encountered several tractor trailers using the road as a through route.

U.S. 12 descends to its junction and merge with U.S. 93 at Lolo. The two highways join together along a four-lane highway northward to the city of Missoula, which is the home of the University of Montana. Missoula sees U.S. 12 and 97 split, with each highway having a Business Loop to boot. The city overall acts as a regional economic hub with your typical array of strip malls, fast food chains, car dealerships, etc. on the south side. Downtown lies adjacent to the Univ. of Montana campus, and the main streets reflect that spatial relationship with a wide array of businesses and residences. Missoula bustled on our visit to the city with college students and visitors alike.

U.S. 12 east parts ways with U.S. 93 north on the south side of Missoula. U.S. 93 follows a newer bypass route to the west, while original U.S. 93 carries the Business loop moniker with U.S. 12 into downtown. The U.S. 93 bypass is not access-controlled, so businesses and other structures line the route.

Business Loop Interstate 90 cuts a swath through downtown along Broadway Street. Although the route may be officially decommissioned, signs are still in place along the entire routing. Just north of the city the land rises in the form of mountains. A Union Pacific Railroad line and the Interstate 90 freeway segregate the city from the hillside.

Business Loop Interstate 90 and U.S. 12 Business merge at the intersection of Broadway Street and Higgens Avenue in downtown Missoula. Here we look east at a reassurance shield assembly on Broadway Street as it heads toward Interstate 90 Exit 105. The University of Montana campus lies just southeast of downtown..

Montana is as they say, Big Sky Country. Our trip justified that nickname with crystal clear deep blue skies on the drive west to Idaho. Interstate 90 was lightly traveled and was one of the smoother freeways we encountered in the Pacific Northwest. Speed limits are set at 75 mph, and we averaged 75-80 along with everyone else.

Along most of Interstate 90 in western Montana are parallel alignments of old U.S. 10. Interstate 90 replaced U.S. 10 completely from Billings west to the Seattle area, however many of the old sections remain in use as Interstate Business loops (even though those also are falling by the wayside).

We spotted this old U.S. 10 bridge spanning the Clark Fork river at St. Regis (Exit 33 of Interstate 90). The old alignment spurs east to Four Mile Road, which just loops back to old U.S. 10 near this bridge. Montana 135 provides the only route out of town outside of the freeway.

One of the last undivided sections of Interstate highway is no more as widening of Interstate 90 on its trek through Lookout Pass is complete. The drive is still dramatic however, with a fast descent to Mullan some six miles west of the state line. There lies one of a handful of remaining business loops for Interstate 90 in Idaho.

At 4,680 feet, Lookout Pass represents the Montana and Idaho state line along Interstate 90. The boundary also represents the edge of the Mountain and Pacific Time Zones. For Interstate 90 westbound motorists, a 6% grade carries drivers downward over the next five miles to Mullan.

At Wallace, one of, in my humble opinion, the more interesting facets of Interstate history lies. Dubbed “the last traffic light on Interstate 90″, the signal at the intersection of Business Loop I-90 (Bank Street) at 6th Street remains in place in a permanent flash cycle. The town was bypassed by a sleek modern viaduct just north of downtown in 1991. A ceremony was actually held to bury the last traffic light hindering Interstate 90′s free flow across the country. However signals still hang on span wires in the heart of town.

A sign attached to a small wagon in Wallace directs drivers on Business Loop I-90 westbound into the heart of town where the famous last I-90 stop light remains in place. The sleek peach coloured viaduct carries four lanes of Interstate 90 overhead.

All Idaho business loops for Interstate 90 west of Osburn were decommissioned in 2005 with the exception of the one at Post Falls. Signage, for the most part, was altered to reflect the loop removals. At Coeur d’Alene, the largest city of northern Idaho, Interstate 90 straddles the scenic Coeur d’Alene Lake ahead of the city center. If you think that sprawl cannot penetrate far northern Idaho, you are sadly mistaken, as Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls are undergoing tremendous growth, and the traffic along Interstate 90 definitely reflected that.

I am unclear if Coeur d’Alene generates enough job and industry to consider itself independent of the much larger Spokane to the west. The close proximity however may relegate the city to bedroom community status to the eastern Washington city. Bedroom community status most certainly applies to Post Falls however with regards to Spokane, but perhaps also its neighbor to the east. Nonetheless all three cities are substantial for the placement in the far northwest Rockies.

Sherman Avenue eastbound at 2nd Street in downtown Coeur d’Alene. Sherman Avenue and 15th Street represent the historical path of Business Loop Interstate 90 through town. However as of 2006, all signs were removed of the designation. The city otherwise is gaining condo high rises of all things. Two were already in place along Sherman Avenue to the west of downtown, and the tall crane in the background here is in place to construct a third high rise.

Interstate 90 maintains just four lanes through the Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls area, but the freeway widens to six lanes through metro Spokane. Spokane itself looks like an older city with older high rise buildings and a more established suburban expansion. The commuting axis appears to be based upon U.S. 2 & 395 (Division Street) rather than Interstate 90. If that is the case, it is definitely a departure from the norm (see Boise and Tucson as good cases in point).

U.S. 2 east & 395 north (Division Street) northbound on the approach to Bridgeport Avenue in Spokane. The tandem follow Interstate 90 east into Spokane through to Exit 281. Division Street carries the highways north from there six miles to their split at Newport Highway.

While in town, we picked up a friend of Chris’s in north Spokane, and that took us upon Division Street for a few miles. The four to six-lane arterial teems with traffic and well established businesses and other structures. For the growing traffic woes that occur along the north-south road, WSDOT is building a new freeway for U.S. 395 to the east. Upon completion, the North Spokane Corridor (NSC) freeway will join Interstate 90 with U.S. 395 north of its split with U.S. 2 near Mead. This will alleviate traffic on Division Street for commuters between downtown and Spokane Valley to the north.

Spokane’s other freeway? Well technically it acts like a glorified off-ramp, but a short section of freeway joins Exit 282 with Washington 290 (Trent Avenue) between Interstate 90 and eastern reaches of the downtown area. For those curious about the numbering, it is not a failed Interstate 290, but rather Washington 2-90 as it relates to U.S. 2(-90). Washington, like South Carolina, uses a state road numbering system that implies loops and spurs from parent routes. So instead of South Carolina 762, it is technically South Carolina 7-62. This is why there are so many highways in the Washington 500 series.

Traveling south on the freeway connector between Washington 290 (Trent Avenue) and Interstate 90. A half-diamond interchange along the short freeway serves Second Avenue. The other Spokane area freeway carries U.S. 2 to Spokane International Airport from Interstate 90.

Sunset on us earlier that I had hoped, claiming our daylight by the time U.S. 395 splits from Interstate 90 west at Ritzville. Twilight carried us west to the magnificent Columbia River valley at Vantage. There we stopped at a view point and gazed at the deep valley below where Interstate 90 spans the Columbia along a four-lane cantilever span.

With the stars and moon overhead, Interstate 90 descends in dramatic fashion into the Columbia River valley at the town of Vantage. The Columbia flows south from British Columbia to the Tri-Cities before turning west along the Oregon and Washington border to the Pacific.

The rest of the drive was done in darkness, but we did note that only the Moses Lake Business Loop for Interstate 90 remains signed along the Interstate 90 mainline. However we did receive reports since then that the one in Cle Elum is still kicking outside of the freeway. Otherwise the drive west over the Cascades was amazing in that the Labor Day rush of traffic eastbound resulted in a 3o miles of traffic congestion well outside of the Seattle metro area. Our drive was relatively easy fortunately.

After we parted ways with Chris and Curt, we traveled south to Olympia, covering the suburban Washington 167 and 512 freeways on the way. Both roads were underpowered with just four lanes overall and an occasional six-lane section with auxiliary lanes. Without daylight, we gathered that both were rather nondescript. Day 8 took us around downtown Olympia and then south to Portland International Airport.