Hungry Horse Lake (Leaving)
My first stop was Whitefish, Montana (where I lost Road Sister). I had three errands to perform: buy groceries, get gas, and wash clothes. I could not remember Whitefish's available services so I stopped at the first grocery store I saw. It was one of those local places that did not stock the major brands and everyone uses their time in the checkout line to catch up with everybody else in town. So even though I was seconf in line it took me 15 minutes to get checked out. The local good-looking single guy was putting on the "helpless male in a grocery store" act and running back to get ingredients he had forgottent to make omelettes that morning.
I stopped at the Conoco only to see a Safeway right across the street and a Laundromat in the gas station. I f I had went there first I would have washed my clothes, got gas and went to Safeway in parallel. The washing went fine but after 40 minutes in the dryer my clothes were still wet. They would have to dry in the car. It was 10 o'clock and I had barely started my trip.
There were a lot of places to camp on lakes or streams along the way. I stopped at a few places and they looked fine. I kept going though. I had convinced myself I needed to go pick up my checks in Oregon, so I wanted to get within striking distance. When I got to Lake Kocanusa, the lake McGilvrey is on, I stopped at a few campsites and was unimpressed. Some of them were just large flat areas covered with gravel designed for up to 100 RVs to park next to each other. Now that is camping. I hoped McGivrey would not be that way.
I was giving in to the desire for comfort food again. At hungry horse I had gone into the town of Columbia Falls one day and got a burger, onion rings, and a huckleberry shake. I had a desire for a meal like that again rather than the junk I bought in Whitefish. I drove past the turn off to McGilvrey and headed into Libby 15 miles away. I was also looking for a cheap blowup raft to float on the lake with. I had forgotten to look at whitefish but had tried hungry horse, columbia falls, and Eureka to no avail. In libby I tried several places. I found one that sold them for $5 but they were all out. I stopped at a local Mexican/ Burger place, ordered a burger, onion rings, and raspberry shake. Close enough. Then Iremembered I was not going to buy hamburger because of the recall of 18 million pounds of it by ConAgri, but I took a chance and ate my meal at the local park by the river.
By 3:30 I had backtracked to McGilvrey passing the Libby dam (pictured above) and found a pretty good site. It had lots of cover, the right distance from the restrooms and it was peaceful and quiet. The campground was in a nice pine forest with lots of barriers between sites. The only place to get to the lake was the day use area which was a ways away, but all in all I was satisfied