Here’s a tip, in case you find yourself in Colfax, Washington, at lunch: go to the Top Notch Cafe, whose sign says they have the best burgers in the United States. The sign is not wrong.

And the proprietor of the place, after determining that I was in fact a photographer, said, “So, you DO know about the covered bridge, don’t you?” I did not know about it, and he kindly provided directions to it, which is the only reason that this photograph came to be.

And, also the only reason that I found my favorite memento of the trip. On the edge of the dirt road leading to the bridge, I spotted a little pile of animal bones. Naturally, I saved one, a flat one that’s about two inches long and a half-inch wide. I gave it a name, too, and it rode along with us and now resides on the shelf-o-randomness in my office, where it keeps company with a toy soldier (painted gold) that I found on a sidewalk in Portland, Oregon, a glow-in-the-dark archangel Michael, etc. Anyway, the bone’s name is Leon Roadbone, of course after this guy.)

EDIT – SAD UPDATE
Ryan McGinty, an excellent Palouse photographer, posted on my Instagram account that this bridge burned down in a wildfire on September 7. “You have one of the last photos of this bridge,” he said. You can read about the bridge here.

near Colfax, Washington
photographed 9.1.2020