Road Trips: Making the Rounds – Installment 40

This column features recollections of the author’s 38 years as a golf writer. These installments stem from his many travels and experiences, which led to a gradual understanding that the game has many intriguing components, especially its people.

It’s been too long for a road trip. Since moving to Whidbey Island in January 2024 (https://www.golfcoursetrades.com/moving-making-the-rounds-installhomment-28/) and escaping the bustle of Seattle, my wife, Anni, and I have been putting our noses to the grindstone with home improvements while adapting to a new social life. Out-of-town excursions have been riding the ferry to and from medical appointments in the big city. Nice views from the big boats of Puget Sound and mounts Rainier and Baker and the Olympic Range, but not so adventurous.

That close-to-home business ended in late May and early June 2025. We honored a promise to friend Mark Miller – featured in my latest column (https://www.golfcoursetrades.com/multi-talented-golf-course-architect-part-1/ and https://www.golfcoursetrades.com/multi-talented-golf-course-architect-part-2/) – to visit him and his wife Karen in Arvada, Colo. After briefly contemplating driving there and back, a less rigorous idea was flying to Denver, staying with the Millers for three nights, then renting a car to motor through portions of Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, western Montana, Walla Walla in southeastern Washington and Yakima (where I grew up) in route home.

The entire trip took 10 nights, six of which were spent in hotels following our stay at the Millers’. Here’s how it unfolded.

Colorado

Mark and Karen are wonderful hosts. On our first night they introduced us at a backyard barbeque to folks we’d heard about: Mark’s brother Blake; shirt-tail relative Colton and his wife Janelle, and her mom Rosie (Karen’s cousin) at their home alongside Lake Arbor. Unfortunately, the mountains typically on view were behind low-lying clouds our entire stay at the Millers, frustrating Mark. (I kidded him, “Are you sure mountains are out there?”).

Blake and Colton thanked me for my story on their multi-talented relative. And Mark was correct about Blake, a talented lead guitar player and a very funny guy. I’ve been fortunate to run across people who share my sense of humor. Blake is that and more, especially when the brothers played a few of their amusing songs in the family room. He’s also an award-winning videographer and involved in big-time charity events. Adding to the fun is Blake’s new website: www.ironheadgolf.com. Besides an online store, it features a cartoon show called “Duffy Mulligan” in which a droll Scottish golfer comments on the game’s latest goings-on. Blake gave me a sleeve of his “Midieval [sic] Distance Dragon Balls,” which has the tagline “Play with Me Balls!”

Colton is also fun. The 30-something told droll stories about doing PR for the ill-fated Major League Rugby Glendale Raptors, which was wholly funded by a city with only 4,600 people. He’s now sowing myriad random seeds on his blog https://www.coltmediallc.com/our-publications.html, including the cosmic “Official Green Chile Review Database.”

Next day we traveled to Rocky Mountain National Park; reservations required. Magnificent roads with many viewpoints, but sadly no mountains, moose or bears to be seen. My day brightened while purchasing a National Park lifetime pass. The lady in the ranger’s hat saw the flag on my driver’s license, signifying my veteran’s status, and said the pass was free. Even after 50-plus years, military service still has dividends.

After watching a dozen elk resting undramatically in a meadow, we stopped by The Stanley Hotel, the inspiration for Stephen King’s novel, “The Shining” (filmed at Timberline Lodge in Oregon). Many horror movies use The Stanley on shoots. Because it was filled with hordes of camera-toting Memorial Day weekend tourists, this was a brief stop.

Next day was a round at Greg Mastriona Golf Courses at Hyland Hills in Westminster (https://www.golfhylandhills.com/), a civic treasure with its 18-hole Gold Course, nine-hole Blue Course (which we played), two par-3 nines, clubhouse and range, and the neighboring, kid-friendly Adventure Golf & Raceway (“The Ultimate Adventure!”).

We also visited Boulder, home of the University of Colorado. We strolled up and down the car-free Pearl Street enjoying the chill vibe and gelato after outstanding chicken fajitas.

Mark’s dad, Dwain Miller, was a key figure in preserving the city’s open spaces after becoming Boulder’s first director of the Parks and Recreation Department in 1961, when city park land totaled a mere 4 acres. As a member of PLAN-Boulder, a group that sought to acquire and control open spaces, Miller changed that, helping preserve properties destined for residential and commercial development. The seminal project was called “The Boulder Green Belt.”

By the time he left his post in August 1968 to become a professor of outdoor recreation at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, the senior Miller had increased Boulder’s city park properties to 212 acres (none to large golf spaces).

Dwain, who passed away in 2018 at age 89, left a legacy that endures today. “He taught people how to have fun outside,” said his wife Doris Miller in an obit in the Boulder Daily Camera. Dwain’s eldest son, Mark, has taken a similar path in the world of golf.

Our stay with Mark and Karen was capped by a bucket-list item: a concert at Red Rocks in Morrison. We were not disappointed as three bluegrass bands – The Infamous Stringbusters, Kitchen Dwellers and Leftover Salmon – entertained a roaring crowd for five hours in the spectacular natural amphitheater. The next morning, we picked up our rental car – a Jeep Compass – and began the rest of our journey.

On the Road Again

On the way to our first hotel in Glenwood Springs, we stopped at the Colorado Rocky Mountain School in Carbondale (https://www.crms.org/), which Anni attended over 50 years ago. Apparently, much has changed since then. As we drove through Carbondale (pop. 6,400), she noticed many new buildings and homes. The curriculum for CRMS emphasizes the arts and outdoors. It has a student-run, eight-acre vegetable garden that feeds students, with excess produce donated to local food banks. We were treated to a nice lunch in the cafeteria, a 2-hour tour and stops at some of Anni’s former campus haunts.

The visit to CRMS was a good way to start the opening leg of our journey westward. It involved six overnighters at four different hotels – with two nights in Missoula and two in Walla Walla. Our first stop was Glenwood Springs near the Wyoming border.

After stocking up on water, snacks, bananas, supplies and a small cooler at a Target store, we enjoyed a delightful dinner at the Rocky Mountain Pizza Co. (https://www.rockymountainpizzagws.com/) in Glenwood Springs (pop. 10,200). Leaving the restaurant at 8:30, the downtown streets were virtually empty.

About Travel & Hotels

The places we stayed were acceptable. But at an average of $200 per night, they were seven times more expensive than when I made similar road trips in the late-1980s and ‘90s. But in those days I was alone staying in flea-bag motels along highways during my golf travels (https://golfcoursetrades.com/making-the-rounds-part-1/). Gas today is also much higher now ($1.25 a gallon then). It was lowest at just over $3 a gallon in Colorado and Wyoming. It increased slightly in Montana and Idaho, with our home state by far the highest at over $4 a gallon, due to many excise taxes. (Note that Washington and Wyoming have no income tax, unlike Colorado, Idaho and Montana.) We found that particularly true along Interstate 90 at Snoqualmie Pass. It wasn’t until we were back on the freeway that Anni mentioned we’d just paid $5.50 a gallon!

One night I jotted down some observations about hotel life. In general, the rooms seem to be designed by interior decorators with no clue about making them guest friendly. Here are some personal bugaboos with hotel rooms:

• Nice big showers with clean towels hung on the other side of the bathroom. No towel bars where guests can hang them to dry and conserve water and energy as the hotels encourage their guests to do.
• No toe space under beds, tables or sofas so guests stub their toes in spaces usually with room for human feet.
• Artsy light fixtures with tiny switches painted black on black metal strips. It’s no fun slamming into things at 3:00 a.m. on the way to the bathroom. And why no ceiling lights to help search through suitcases?
• Speaking of dimness: Some of us enjoy reading at bedtime. The hotel-standard 40-watt bulbs in the bedside lamps make that insanely difficult. Not all of us are staying there for the romantic vibe.
• Useless tiny soap bars and body washes.
• Pillows like hay bales.

But I digress.

Jackson Hole & Idaho Falls

The longest leg of our trip from Glenwood Springs to the next hotel in Idaho Falls was about 500 miles. But it went by fast and furious as the speed limit in Wyoming is 80 mph (same in Montana and Idaho). But since this is America’s least populated and 10^th largest state with fewer than 600,000 people and sparse vehicles, traffic is virtually nonexistent and it’s easy to go through Wyoming at 100 mph. I’ve driven over remote roads for years and know when varmints (mainly deer) lie low, and when to pick my shots. Though its mpg wasn’t great, the Compass had the punch to devour miles.

By the time we’d gone 400 miles and reached Jackson Hole – a place on Anni’s wish list – the mountains around the town were hidden behind the same clouds that likely came from Colorado. In the 1800s, “Hole” was a term used to describe a high mountain valley. It was clear – though not as overtly as we’d hoped – how the mighty Tetons lent this town its name.

Idaho Falls was a pleasant surprise. After days of dismal weather and beclouded mountain vistas, this city of 70,000 was blessedly sun-washed. The Falls themselves are spectacularly loud and misty. We enjoyed walking off the day’s grueling drive and our big dinner on the city’s 5-mile-long riverwalk.  

The waterfall was formed by a man-made diversion dam for hydroelectric power in 1909 (and redone in 1982). A nuclear reactor project created in 1949 produced the world’s first “useful” electricity. The Idaho Temple – the Mormon Church’s eighth in operation – towers over the city.  We were told by the hotel clerk that the city’s undergoing a change in demographics from its former LDS predominance. We found evidence of this with our restaurant server at Snow Eagle Brewing ($6 microbrews and a $30 ribeye steak dinner! – https://snoweaglebrewing.com/). He sported an afro and goatee, with the latter maybe like those sported by the Mormon pioneers who settled the town in 1864.

Other Observations & Good Things about Modern Hotels

Not all is bad with modern hotels: Nice touches include free breakfasts; making your own waffles in one of those idiot-proof griddles; fresh fruit; coffee way better than 30 years ago. And the rooms – as usual – were clean and tidy. We always leave a tip for the often-thankless maids, who likely make minimum wages and, in some cases, are single mothers.

Missoula & Flathead Lake

From Idaho Falls, we headed north on Interstate 82 to Missoula, a college town and one of my favorite cities anywhere. Passed over the nearby Montana border and more cars through Dillon and Butte east of the Continental Divide. While living and working in Billings in the early to mid-1970s, I had several friends from Butte.

Most were Irishmen, Auld Sod descendants who immigrated to Butte in the late-1800s to find work in the copper mines. During that period many wonderful Victorian buildings were built in what was then, remarkably, the most populated city west of the Mississippi River.

I once visited Butte’s notorious Berkeley Pit, an open copper mine started in 1955 by the Anaconda Copper Mining Company. By the time it was closed in 1982, the hole was 3,800 feet deep. I stood on a viewing platform and watched the microscopic copper-hauling trucks ascend the pit’s interior edges in a slow circular motion. Only when these mammoths reached the pit’s rim did their size – and monumental load – hit home. The tires measured 36 by 51 inches, each truck stood 21 feet high and was 24 feet wide and 43 feet long. Their capacity was an astounding 320 tons.

We arrived at our Missoula hotel, Fairfield Inn & Suites, in the afternoon on May 29. I called one of my favorite local courses, Highlands, for a tee time. Unfortunately, a men’s club event was underway on the nine-hole layout. We drove out anyway as I wanted Anni to enjoy the views. But, since my last visit here three decades ago, the trees had grown such that many vistas were blocked, even from the veranda of the clubhouse, a former mansion with one of the sweetest bars in the Pacific Northwest.

Returning to the hotel we noticed children running around in swimming togs. The Fairfield brand is family-friendly, and this branch boasted two large water slides. We septuagenarians donned our swim gear and joined the fun, hiking up two dozen steps to barrel down the watery chutes, splashing (more like smashing) ungracefully into the pool to smiles from the kids and parents.

The next day we loaded our sticks and drove north to Polson on the south end of Flathead Lake, the largest natural body of freshwater in the western U.S. and one of the cleanest lakes in the world. We met our old friend, Rob Perry, a noted golf photographer who’s contributed images to my articles and the books we’ve published. Five years ago, Rob sold his house in Bellevue, Wash. – and longtime membership at Broadmoor Golf Club in Seattle – and relocated to Polson. He still shoots golf (including the exclusive Stock Farm Club in Hamilton south of Missoula; see some of his handiwork here: https://stockfarm.com/) as well as wildlife. For Rob’s full portfolio, visit https://www.robperry.com/.

We played 18 holes with Rob at his “home” course of Polson Bay. When I originally visited here there were only nine holes; that’s now the “Olde Course.” We played the newer Championship Course, and afterwards, visited Rob’s condo, where the unblocked views of Flathead Lake and the surrounding Salish and Mission mountains are unbeatable.

Walla Walla

What was supposed to be one of the shorter jaunts on this odyssey – 350 miles – became one of the most arduous. Opting for scenery versus boring Interstate 90 – we took U.S. Highway 12. Unfortunately, this route has hundreds of hair-pin turns, few passing lanes, slow local drivers, many RVs, pickups towing fishing boats, and an average sub-60 speed. It took us seven hours to reach Walla Walla in southeast Washington.

Fortunately, the travel was stellar under the bright sunshine, as much of the road borders the various forks off Idaho’s fast-moving Clearwater River. We saw many bused-in rafters riding rapids as well as fishermen trawling on calmer stretches. Near the end of the Clearwater Canyon was an inviting homemade sign for smoothies and fresh pie. We pulled off and met the purveyors, a mom and her young daughter, two friendly sights for four sore eyes. They whipped up refreshing rhubarb, strawberry and banana smoothies for us, and for good measure, we bought a delicious rhubarb-apple pie.

Walla Walla is the unquestioned wine hub of Washington, among the nation’s top three wine-producing states. It seems like every other downtown business is a tasting room or purveyor of the area’s 120-plus wineries. Among the winery owners are Yakima native, actor Kyle MacLachlan, and retired NFL players Drew Bledsoe (born in Ellensburg north of Yakima) and Sidney Rice of the Seahawks.

We found the late-spring weather typical of southeast Washington: clear with temps in the mid-80s. Our accommodations were the venerable Marcus Whitman Hotel and Conference Center in the middle of downtown. Opened in 1928, famous guests have included presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Lyndon Johnson, actress Shirley Temple and jazz pioneer Louis Armstrong. Following the death in 2017 of Walla Walla native and “Batman” TV star, Adam West, the bat signal was projected onto the side of the hotel in tribute.

After browsing Yelp reviews of the hotel’s two eateries – and reading several ghastly comments – we selected Hattaway’s on Alder, a short walk from the hotel. We were not disappointed with this relatively new place, owned by a married couple with roots in the Southeast. The restaurant hummed, and the attention to detail by staff was reminiscent of the popular Hulu show, “The Bear.” My fried chicken and grits dinner was exceptional, and Anni was also pleased with her grilled steelhead.

We took a Sunday morning walk around Whitman University, a private liberal arts college with 1,500 undergraduates. Originally called Whitman Seminary when founded as a prep school in 1859, the institution was named after Marcus Whitman, a pioneering missionary who was killed in 1847 along with 12 others by a group of Cayuse Indians. It became Whitman College in 1882 and dropped its affiliation with the Congregational Church in 1907. Besides Adam West, alumni include actor Dirk Benedict, Chief Justice William O. Douglas, and University of Arizona head basketball coach, Tommy Lloyd. A golf buddy of mine, Seattle land-use attorney Jerry Hillis, is a proud Whitman graduate and a member of its Athletic Hall of Fame.  

On our final day in Walla Walla, we scored a late-afternoon tee time at Wine Valley Golf Club. The Dan Hixson design (who I’ve written about before: https://golfcoursetrades.com/no-goats-no-glory/) lies about six miles west of town amid the rolling, colorful fields of canola, lentils, barley and chickpeas grown in the geographically unique “Palouse” region. Stretching 7,600 yards from the tips, the layout is ranked among the top five courses in the state. We joined two members and retirees, Dan and Julie James, who helped us negotiate it.

Earlier that Sunday, 36-hole qualifying for the 2025 U.S. Open at Oakmont was held at Wine Valley. The two qualifiers, amateur Matt Vogt of Indianapolis and pro Brady Calkins of Chehalis, Wash., carded rounds of 8-under 136 and 7-under 137. It’s likely these two played a few rounds beforehand at the inland links. There’s deep-bunker danger alongside large sweeping and windswept fairways, and its massive greens have many peaks, valleys and crazy tilts.

Moxee & Home

After two nights in Walla Walla, our road trip was nearing its end. Our final stop was Moxee, pop. 4,300, a few miles southeast of Yakima. The hamlet was settled by Mortimer Thorp and some French-Canadian farmers in 1867. It was called “Moxee” after a root eaten by the Sahaptin tribe. Settlers soon found the soil and mild climate ideal for growing hops, which are used in beer, medicines, cooking and crafts. Since the 1930s, Moxee has been known as the “Hop Capital of the World,” with local farmers growing more of the lucrative crop than anywhere on the planet. A popular Pacific Northwest “fresh-off-the-farm brew” is produced by Bale Breaker in the town.

Our reason for visiting was to spend our final night at the home of the best man at our 1983 wedding, Mike Wentz, my friend since the 1960s when I was growing up in Yakima. Mike is a retired cement finisher who rose through his union ranks to oversee and increase the retirement benefits for its thousands of members and their families. He’s also one of the keenest gardeners I’ve ever known. This guy can grow anything, including 120-pound gold-medal-winning watermelons four consecutive years at the annual Yakima County Fair, before being asked by judges to “retire” and let other growers have an opportunity to win.

Mike’s immaculate yard is awash in color and exotic plants during central Washington’s six-month growing season. Surprising touches include a “herd” of praying mantis to naturally control pests, and a robot Husqvarna lawn mower he calls “Baby.”

For dinner we went to a grill in downtown Yakima. For a century the city has touted itself as “The Fruit Bowl of the Nation.” In addition to hops, the surrounding valleys house untold acres of apples, pears, apricots, plums, cherries, wine grapes, and hundreds of “row crops” (tomatoes, peppers, asparagus, melons, etc.). Many people are needed to harvest this bounty.

We drove by the train station after dinner. I recalled every spring an influx of migrant workers who had gotten a lift – legal or otherwise –disembarked here. After working from April through October in the fruit, the mob scene at the Yakima station recurred in fall when the workers returned to Mexico.   

With the current administration’s crackdown on “dangerous illegal aliens,” I wonder who will be thinning, irrigating, spraying and tending the trees, picking and packing the fruit in massive warehouses destined for global markets.

As a teenager in Yakima’s West Valley suburb, I always found work in the fruit. My jobs included hauling bins from orchards; picking; thinning; grading; bringing “shook” – paper wrappings, boxes, and trays – to apple packers; and building the wood pallets used in those days. I also smudged, a vile, after-midnight task filling 5-gallon cans with kerosene and lighting them on fire to prevent tree frost. Thankfully, this grossly unhealthy, smoke-belching practice has been replaced by large rotating fans.

Who’s going to do these jobs now? I’ve heard that American teenagers – like I was back in the day – avoid this kind of work. My sincere hope is that a compromise is reached with farmers, who already face razor-thin profit margins and don’t deserve another government-induced headache.

Guess I’m sounding remindful and reflective here. That can happen after a long road trip.

Jeff Shelley has written and published 10 books as well as numerous articles for print and online media since 1987. Among his titles are three editions of the book, “Golf Courses of the Pacific Northwest.” The Whidbey Island resident was editorial director of Cybergolf.com from 2000-15, co-founder of the Northwest Golf Media Association and president of the nonprofit First Green (https://www.thefirstgreen.org/). To contact Jeff: fairgreens@seanet.com.