Spokane has housing market woes, we lost a couple of our big plants, we have a wee problem with unemployment, and we have ongoing controversy with city budget…but hey, we also have 2 skating rinks, a minor league baseball team, hockey, arena football, college teams of all sorts, ski and crosscountry venues an easy drive from downtown, a waterfall and park at the heart of the city, other parks designed by the guy who did Central Park, a decent cost of living, affordable housing, and real good food. A kayak is a common summer car-topper, and skis in winter. We host (even IN the city) marmots, cougar, bear, coyotes, moose, deer, bald eagles, herons, osprey…and California quail by the thousands. We can look out and see mountains, we’re 80 miles from another country, we’re 20 miles from another state, and we’re right on the highway that crosses the northern US. Big stage shows stop here. We have casinos. We’re an easy drive to Yellowstone or Crater Lake or ocean beach. And you can walk to most sites and hotels downtown without breaking a sweat—it’s also pretty likely that part of that walk will be in a park beside a whitewater river. What’s not to love?
Spokane the 11th-happiest city in the nation—if you believe our tweets.
by CJ | Feb 20, 2013 | Journal | 10 comments
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It also has several very good writers.
Errm, icy and/or packed snow refrozen roads? If one needs a 4WD Subaru and studs to get to the market, well, not so nice.
Lol, liking the new avatar, Paul.
We love the snow. We don’t need studs, just all-weathers. AWD does fine for us. Thing about living next to ski resorts—we have snow removal equipment. In Oklahoma City, a 2″ snow is a big problem. Here, the year we got 12″ snowfalls over and over and over, traffic in the city never really stopped moving. We’re equipped to clear our drive and walks; the city clears the streets, and clears them every 2 hours. OTOH, if you’re up on a mountain in an isolate cabin, you better have a blade on the front of your pickup, and you’d better get to it before it gets bad.
The weather I hate is unremitting hot and clear. I go homicidal after a little of that. I grew up during 3-4 years of serious drought, and grew to hate blue skies, dusty skies, and no rain and dead plants.
Funny, I live in Fort Collins, rated 13th. Must just be my personal situation that has me down.
I like it here except the drought conditions are a problem.
What drove me nuts was Northern CA winters with unrelenting rain for weeks. I needed wipers on the inside of my windshield. That’s also where my body decided to start having allergies.
My sister lives in Spokane and I’ve never been. It sounds pretty nice from your description. Maybe someday…
We like the area too. My dad’s older sister lived there for years and my husband and I visited last October checking out possible job locations up around Colville and the Wenatchee area. I’ve got alot of family in the Vancouver BC area. And boy am I with you on the heat! Even in the mountains in Arizona, summer sucks. We have no problem with snow — just got 8 inches today, 9 inches last Monday (which melted in 2 days) — heck, even Phoenix and Scottsdale got snow today!
I hear you on the drought, dead plants, and blowing dust. We had a nice little rain Tuesday night and there’s a thunderboomer icon on my weather widget. If I had to choose between being too hot or too cold, though, I’d have to opt for the too hot.
Nice new icon. Shows your scholarly side. We just got a very nice snowstorm here in Colorado. Hopefully, we’ll get some really good spring snows to make up for the drought. It’s been so dry here that the well is down and more iron is coming through the pipes!
Also shows where I got the “WOL” as this is the illustration from Winnie Ther Pooh of Owl signing his name…
You looked at a different list….the one I found on line shows Seattle as #17 happiest and Spokane at #42.