Not to be used for toll roads (unless run by druids)

In ancient times, hundreds of years before the dawn of history. There lived a strange race of people - the Druids. No one knows who they were, or what they were doing, but their legacy remains, hewn into the living rock of Stonehenge.

- Spinal Tap

One of my favorite things about the state of Washington is that someone (namely Sam Hill, who, when not busy getting his Quaker on, was building monuments and developing NW roads like a mofo back around the early 1900's) bothered to erect a replica of Stonehenge that looks like it was shaped in a giant plaster cast. It is one of those places like Carhenge and House on the Rock that I love for the sheer whackiness of human creativity AND it's in relatively easy driving distance AND close proximity to the Maryhill Museum of Art, which I also love. As a result, it has become a popular destination in my roadtrip canon.

As it turns out, it is also the gateway to my late May getaway with my friends Jen and MQ. Now that we have some planning done, I am really excited to get going. We are, by the way, possibly the lamest deciders EVER. After getting stymied by the question of who was going to drive, we had to resort to writing the names of our cars on scraps of paper, which we then crumbled up, so one of our number could pick our ride. (In our defense, we were really tired after the series of negotiations on the merits vs. jivery of toll bridges and whether we should pay the Hood River toll, since the bridge at Biggs is closed.) In the end, Agamemnon (who is playing "Where's Waldo?" in the picture above) and I won. Man, is that a change from the hunka hunka burning Dodge I drove in my college days. Back then people would have wanted to take any care BUT mine!

Our plans are relatively loose (which I like - there's something appealing about just going where the road takes you!) and involve travelling around and taking pictures of a part of the NW I've never really explored before. On the itinerary so far, are a night in Ellensburg or Wenatchee and a night in Spokane as well as visits to Leavenworth and Grand Coulee Dam. Between my awesome new camera and the months of trying to not waste gas, I have to admit to being pretty excited to get out of the city for a bit. If I manage to capture any druids, I'll be sure to post them here!