Days #613-619 of Our Epic Trip

7-7-2025
H: 93ºF L: 59ºF
Bass Pro Shop, Union Gap, Washington

We stayed the night in a Bass Pro Shop parking lot. It was pretty quiet. Across the street is a restaurant supply store that we are excited to check out tomorrow before we leave.

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7-8-2025
H: 100°F L: 69°F
Thousand Trails Crescent Bar, Quincy, Washington

We went to the restaurant supply store and got a 25 pound bag of chickpeas! It was a great price.

We are staying on Crescent Bar in Washington at a resort right on Columbia River. Since it was so hot when we arrived at our new campground, we stayed inside the camper after getting set up. After dinner, Daniel and I took a walk by the river. We saw rabbits frolicking and watched the sun set.

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7-9-2025
H: 86ºF L: 66ºF
Thousand Trails Crescent Bar, Quincy, Washington

We drove around the area and noticed the giant water current ripples in the land across the river. This area was part of the Mega Floods which occurred during the last Ice Age. We just recently learned about this gigantic flood from a PBS video and we were excited to spot the resulting landscape. This area of Washington is known as the Channeled Scablands because the flood washed away all the topsoil right down to the bedrock and made a lot of the area unfavorable for farming.

After dinner, we took the boys for a walk and they got to run off-leash on the beach. The clouds were a beautiful fluffy pink for a short time. I only got one picture before they changed color.

We’re supposed to be chasing the 70°F weather but we’ve gone into the warmer parts of the Pacific Northwest. You can just feel your skin baking in the sun. It feels like sticking your head in an oven.

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7-10-2025
H: 85ºF L: 65ºF
Thousand Trails Crescent Bar, Quincy, Washington

We stayed home most of the day. We went into the town of Quincy, WA to do some grocery shopping at Akins Fresh Market. We found some really good Brussels sprouts – they were huge! The grocery store also had a huge, fully automated bread making machine. We’ve never seen anything like it.

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7-11-2025
H: 91ºF L: 63ºF
Thousand Trails Crescent Bar, Quincy, Washington

We went to Dry Falls in Coulee City, WA. We just happened to stumble upon the story of the Mega Floods while I was scrolling through videos (see above) on Facebook a couple of weeks ago. And now we’re here! We spent some time in the visitor center looking at their displays and getting more information from an enthusiastic park ranger.

We learned that J Harlem Bretz (1882-1981) originally proposed the theory of a giant flood causing the erosion seen in the Channeled Scablands rather than it being normal stream erosion and he spent 40 years researching the geologic evidence. He found a lot of evidence suggesting multiple mega floods but couldn’t find the water source. It wasn’t until geologist Joseph Pardee found evidence of the glacial Lake Missoula in Montana that the pieces of the puzzle fell into place. It took a long time for the scientific community to come around the idea of a mega flood. In 1979, Bretz was awarded the Penrose Medal which “honors eminent research in pure geology” [source].

The floods happened during the last Ice Age (15,000-18,000 years ago) and occurred every 40-150 years as the glacial ice dam melted and ruptured over and over again. It only took two weeks for all the lake water to go from Missoula, MT (water source) to Astoria, OR (water entered ocean). The volume of water is estimated to have been equivalent to all the earth’s rivers times ten. The water raced at 50-70 miles per hour.

Dry Falls was once the world’s largest waterfall. Originally, Dry Falls was 20 miles downstream from its currently location but receded upstream due to erosion. Imagine water flowing over these cliffs (pictured). Where we stood on the cliffs would have been covered by hundreds of feet of water. Wow! We think it’s so cool that people can look at the land and figure out this type of stuff.

On the way home we took back country roads and passed by a lot of wheat fields. It was really pretty.

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7-12-2025
H: 95°F L: 70°F
Thousand Trails Crescent Bar, Quincy, Washington

Daniel pointed out that these hot summer areas in the west are like Michigan winters – you stay indoors because the weather prevents a lot of outdoor activities. We’ve spent a lot of time inside or trying to stay in the shade.

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7-13-2025
H: 100ºF L: 74ºF
Thousand Trails Crescent Bar, Quincy, Washington

It’s so hot today! We did laundry and found the heat to be extra helpful in drying our clothes quickly. There is always a bright spot if you look closely enough.

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Stats

Expenses:

• Tesla Cybertruck fuel: $18.09
• Tesla Model X fuel: $0
• Campsite: $0
• Camping memberships: $38.26
• Food: $97.02

Tesla Cybertruck miles driven: 208.2 (155.3 kWh)

Tesla Model X miles driven: 528.3 (152.4 kWh)

Number of people asking about the Tesla pulling the camper: 1

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#FullTimeTraveling #FullTimeCamping #FullTimeRVing #TravelingTheUS #CamperLife #VeganLife #RetiredLife #FIRELife #QuincyWA #CrescentBarWA #CouleeCityWA #ColumbiaRiver #IceAgeFloods #MegaFloods #ChanneledScablands #DryFalls #JHarlemBretz