Last summer we took a road trip to Montana and had quite the experience traveling from Coeur d’Alene in Idaho to St. Regis in Montana. If you ever find yourself at a complete standstill on the highway (with a way out), this story may be one of caution, or, you might find yourself following our lead and taking the unknown path.
The day started when we left Spokane, Washington on our way to Montana to begin my sister and brother-in-laws wedding weekend. We had enough time before we had to be at the venue in Montana, so we spent the afternoon eating lunch and wandering around Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. After a few blissful hours with our daughter, we set off on I-90 for what should have been a quick hour and a half drive to St. Regis. Little did we know, we were setting off for one of the wildest experiences we have been through.
As we approached Osburn, ID (a small town near the state border), we received a call from my dad, who happened to be a few miles ahead, that traffic was at a stand still and we would want to find a way around. We jumped off the highway and travelled on a side road for as far as we thought we could go. We tried going up an on-ramp but sat for a few minutes with no movement before we decided to back off the ramp and keep trying side roads. We got as far as we could before our maps directed us back on the highway. So, again, we started up the ramp before being stopped by a line of cars that seemed endless. After a few more minutes with no movement, we decided to start checking Google Maps and Waze for any way around this mess.
I was trying to stay in contact with my dad, who happened to be a few miles behind us at that point with no way off the highway, and my sister, who was just ahead of us with no way to get off either, but the cell service was almost non existent. We had a hard enough time trying to get our maps to load to see what we could do. The only reason we were in a hurry and wanted to get around this mess was due to my sister needing our help to unpack the trailer and truck they had stocked up with wedding items from home. The plan was to be at the venue by 4 PM and it was only 1 PM at this point so we should have had plenty of time.
Well, my husband found a way around but had to trick Google Maps because it didn’t give a direct route over the mountain. He found a lake that was on the Idaho-Montana border and another road that continued through to Montana so he added a destination to the lake and a second destination to the venue in Montana to get through. The mileage didn’t seem much further than what we already had to travel the direct route so we thought we would give it a go…
As we turned around on the ramp and headed to the side street maps suggested; 3 tow trucks, a couple police cars and a firetruck whizzed past on the opposite side of the highway. This was our sign that no one was moving for awhile on I-90.
As we started down the backroad, we passed quite a few cars coming back the other way so we assumed they either didn’t want to continue on the route, or came from the other side. The “turned around” idea was confirmed when we saw kids on the side of the road waving to stop us and then a gentlemen on an ATV a little further down waving at us as well. We both said it was a little creepy and the views on the side of the road started giving us “Get Out” movie vibes with abandoned buildings and remote houses scattered. We both had an uneasy feeling but, for some reason, we decided to keep going to see where it would lead. We felt like we had nothing to loose since no one was going anywhere on I-90.
Just as we started up Forest Service Road 7623 I got a call through to my dad and let him know we were heading off the highway and would hopefully see them all soon on the other side, but then I lost service…for the next 2.5 hours!!
As we headed up the service road, we rarely saw other vehicles and, when we did, they were usually pulled over and the occupants were somewhere in the woods. The road slowly turned from paved, to gravel, to a narrow dirt road with lots of rocks and potholes to dodge. It was about 30 minutes into the dirt road that I started to get a little nervous about our trek and started wondering if we were about to be lost in the woods with no service. My husband and I confided in each other every 5-10 minutes that we were both nervous for what was ahead but we felt like we had already gone too far to turn back now. Not to mention, turning around was near impossible on the narrow road.
Our daughter had fallen asleep shortly after we left Coeur d’Alene and was still asleep while we bumped along at 5-10 mph for over an hour and continued to climb in elevation. As soon as we started descending on the other side, our daughter woke up and I was constantly looking out my passenger side window, down the mountainside and held on to the door with worry while my husband dodged back and forth, avoiding rocks and tree limbs sticking out in the road. We were already realizing at this point that the road was intended for off-road vehicles and were very glad we had our Subaru Ascent on this trip, it handled everything we threw at it.
It was shortly after our daughter woke up that we came across a flag pole in the middle of trees with a State of Montana flag waving and we realized we had crossed the state line, over an hour after we had planned. My husband did a great job maneuvering down the mountain and as soon as the elevation evened out, we were rewarded with a beautiful view of blue skies and a clearing in the trees, and we both let out a sigh of relief that we made it this far. We traveled for about another hour on this less treacherous path before coming to a stop sign and a paved highway! We still didn’t have service but we knew we were getting closer to civilization and had made it through the nerve-racking part of our adventure.
As we started laughing about our experience and reviewing how we ended up making the decisions we did, I began to worry that my family was already through the traffic jam and wondering where we were. The last time I spoke to my dad, I lost service after I told him we were on some random service road and, that was nearly 2 hours before! We slowly started regaining service and by the time we made it to the first gas station we found, in Thompson Falls, I had enough service to get a call out.
I first tried my dad but, after he didn’t answer, I tried my sister and my brother, who was riding with her, with no luck either. I finally called my mom, who was traveling from Nevada to Montana and had a different route from us. She answered and let me know that none of them had made it to the venue yet and, last she heard, they were still stuck on I-90…in the same spot!! It was around this time that I also started getting text from my sister and she let me know they had not moved since we left, I felt relieved that no one was worried about us during that time. We just had a crazy adventure together and none of my family had any idea!
We made it to the venue an hour later and relaxed for another few hours before the rest of the family finally made it through. We found out that there was a fatal crash that shut down the highway and we just happened to be the lucky ones that didn’t get blocked in on the highway when it happened.
On a side note, when we headed back a few days later, I was not surprised that the accident happened on this stretch of the interstate. The normally divided highway was under construction and they had all traffic on the East bound side with a single lane going each way. I was driving this stretch and it was not a relaxing drive through that portion of the highway with semi-trucks barreling past us at 65+ with no barrier.
This was a memory of our road trip that we will talk about for years to come. We had so many emotions during those 3 hours, but, at the end of it all, we were thankful we decided to go on this crazy adventure together.
You can read about the rest of our road trip here.
Whole Health Momma 
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