Day four had me leaving Coeur D'Alene which sits just east of the Cabinet Mountains and on the very eastern edge of the plains of eastern Washington. I called up Spokane approach after taking off from Coeur D'Alene so I could get traffic advisories since I would be crossing right over Spokane International and Fairchild AFB on my way to Wenatchee, WA for some golf and then to Portland, OR for the night. Other than the mountains to the north of Spokane and the slightly brownish color, the terrain it didn't look much different than eastern South Dakota or Iowa. As I flew over Fairchild AFB, I could see the air tankers on the ramp (KC-135s I think). I got one traffic advisory from Spokane while I was at 6500 feet. "1-2-R traffic at 2 o'clock. Tanker at 5,000." Pretty cool to be looking down on a 135 from 1500 feet above it. After that it was pretty uneventful until I saw a single cloud on the horizon of the flat plains about 150 miles away. Oh great, unforecast thunderstorms. As I got to about 125 miles out I could tell that it was Mount Rainier rising up in the distance ("That's no moon, that's a space station") As I cruised on towards Wenatchee, Mount Adams also started to come into view to the south. 125 miles of visibility? That NEVER happens in the Midwest. Getting to Wenatchee, I was looking at my charts, verifying I was in the right place, because you can't see the town until you get to where the Columbia River turns toward you and you can see it in the valley. Wenatchee is a very nice place. Even though it's classified as high desert Washington Apples are grown here, and they are also the largest producer of cherries, even beating out the Traverse City area of Michigan. The Columbia River runs right through the town (which is actually split into two municipalities - Wenatchee and East Wenatchee) and irrigates the hills about 1/2 way up the mountains. It's very dry here, getting only about 7" of rain a year, but the Columbia provides enough water to provide plenty of irrigation and green scenery in the lower valley. I was meeting someone to play golf with for the afternoon before heading off to Portland, OR. Oh how plans change. Joe met me at my plane, and he stated as long as I was in town I didn't need my wallet. We grabbed a bite to eat before heading off to the golf course. The golf was great, and I even shot in the 80's - which was pretty good considering I hadn't played in close to or over a year. About hole 4 or so he asked what my plan was for the afternoon, and how soon I needed to get to Portland, and since I didn't have a reservation anywhere for the night, I said it wasn't even a big deal to get there today. Before I knew it, I was invited to go Jet Skiing on the Columbia River and was told I wasn't allowed to get a hotel, I'd stay with him and his family at his place. Even though I'd never met Joe before we ended up talking like we'd known each other for years and the round of golf probably took us about 6 hours because we were just taking it easy. We finished the round and headed to his place to get the Jet Skis. (Sea-Doos actually.) I hadn't been on one of these, since our family got out of it due to the asinine restrictions the police have put on them in Michigan. So I spent a couple hours on the Columbia with Joe and his family. The water was great - about 67 degrees - and was a great way to cool off after being in the desert sun for 6 hours. The sun went down and we trailered the watercraft and headed back to their place for the night. I ended up talking with them over a bowl of homemade chicken soup - which was delicious - till about 11:30 or so before it was finally time to call it a night. So Portland will have to wait until tomorrow... Total flying time for the day: 1 hour 30 minutes.