Boise, Idaho

June 4 - 10, 2014:

It was a windy flight for the Grayhawk on June 4th to Boise, Idaho, but except for not knowing exactly where the GPS was taking me for a while in the Boise city limits, we arrived intact.  We rode along the thousand springs scenic byway (route 30) from Twin Falls to Bliss, Idaho through scenic farm country for the first 40 miles.  It was then onto route 84 for 100 miles, more of a highway route with scenic vistas, a few long climbs and more farm land.                                                                                                       

We arrived at the Boise Riverside RV Park in early afternoon where we have a water and electric site adjacent to the "Greenway" trail that follows the Boise river for about 25 miles.  It is adjacent to the Western Idaho Fairgrounds and the campground owner set us up with free tickets to the horse races Wednesday evening.  The crowd there was huge, the weather was perfect and it was much fun.

The Boise River behind the campground

View of the campground, several work at the fairgrounds next door

The horse race track

Should have bet on # 2

Thursday was going well until I slammed the motor home front door onto my ring finger.  The worst part was that the door locked closed on my finger tip, I couldn't open the door as I didn't have the key and Twinkles was not there to open the door with her key.  Somehow I was able to pull the finger out, but it was deeply cut.  Twinkles arrived back about ten minutes latter and we eventually decided I better go to Urgent Care.  They were close by and were very quick, thorough and professional.  After vital signs, cleaning, X-rays, anesthesia, stitching it up, a tetanus shot and bandaging I was good to go.  I find that at my age all types of accidental injuries happen more frequently, a very bad trend !  I rested most of the afternoon as Twinkles did some fabric shopping but then went to downtown Boise in the evening to check out the 1st Thursday activities there.  Boise has a very vibrant, happening, college downtown scene loaded with restaurants, cafes, coffee shops, bars, offices and stores of all kind.  The first Thursday event is mostly about stores staying open longer and having special sales and promotions.  I ended up stopping at a Chicago Pizza and had an interesting conversation with a potential RV'er from Oregon.

The big blue finger,don't know why I'm smiling

I had spent a few months working in Boise overseeing the remanufacture of five GP40-FH-2 Locomotives at Morrison-Knudsen Corp. for NJ Transit in the early 1990's.  That was probably the favorite project of my career at NJ Transit and I loved Boise, was sad to see that project end.  This is the reason I routed us in this direction, I wanted to re-visit Boise. 

We did a walking tour of downtown Boise on Friday and had an excellent lunch at "Fork".  I am not a big fan of these trendy places with their one syllable names, but we ate outside on the patio, it was a nice sunny day and the food and service were really good. After veg'ing out in the afternoon, I ventured back downtown in the evening to the "Pengilly's" Saloon for a band CD release party.  The "Possum Liv'in" band were interesting musically and they had the place packed, but not something I would care to see again.  It was a fun night out though and I love this bar, it seems to be very original inside, from the early 1900's and very cool. The outside sign with the Buffalo head is pretty cool too !

The Pengilly Saloon sign with the lights on

Inside the Pengilly Saloon with Possum Liv'in on stage

Saturday was back downtown to the Farmers Market which was huge, over a hundred vendors, very well attended and one of the best we have seen in our travels.  Lots of excitement downtown on Saturday as they had a triathlon going on with the finish line on Capital Street.  We happened to be there as the young boys age group was finishing, it was much fun to watch.  Nearby we found the "Basque" area of town with a historical museum, restaurant and market.  We then decided that this was enough downtown action and headed for the hills via the incredible road to Bogus Basin Ski area.  The road is all curves up from 3,000 ft elevation at Boise to 6,000 feet at the ski area over 16 miles and has become a mecca for bicycle riders.  In fact the whole city of Boise is very bike friendly with bike lanes throughout the downtown.

Farmers Market view

A better Farmers Market view

The boys nearing the finish line

Great old Stearns car ad on downtown building

The Idanha Hotel is one of Boise's greatest

Will Rodgers comment

THe Idaho Capital building

Inside the rotunda

One of the things I miss most in this RV lifestyle is live music, especially the blues.  I was surrounded by it back in New Jersey.  In most towns or cities I do a search for it and usually come up with little to nothing.  I checked Boise as I wasn't seeing anything advertised and found the "Boise Blues Society" which have a blues jam every second Sunday of the month.  I went not expecting too much and to my surprise, it was absolutely great. As with most blues society's they are not too good at self promotion or promotion of the musicians, but they are involved with the Blues in the school program.  They could use someone like my friend, Ron Ungarini back in New Jersey to get the word out.  Anyhow, I had almost forgotten what it felt like to hear real blues again, sure was sweet, made my day. 

View of the Blues jam

A Mennonite couple with 4 boys who appear to be in age from newborn to 5 years old moved into a tent camping spot behind our RV Sunday evening.  It didn't look like much fun to me.  At 2 AM I woke with the sounds of horse noises from the adjacent stable area along with a crying baby from the campers.  It went on for a long time and I was debating whether the baby was crying because of the horses or vise-versa, but it was a strange and new night time sound for me.  RV'ers are notorious for complaining about train or highway noise in campgrounds, which normally doesn't bother me, but crying babies is a hard noise to ignore.

Monday morning, I have a muscle pain in the Butt / upper thigh area, don't know why, went to bed fine, maybe a little too much hip shaking yesterday at the blues jam ?  

We go to a local restaurant with great reviews for breakfast, the "Egg Factory" and it is as good as they say.  Twinkles had the lemon poppy seed pancakes with homemade syrup that were absolutely the best ever !  I had an egg dish with real ham, peppers and cheese that was just perfect.  

We then went to Julia Davis Park in downtown Boise with their great rose garden and then a mile away to the Botanical Garden.

The rose garden

Twinkles posing at the rose garden gate

Statue of Julia Davis, Boise pioneer

Trout at the Botanical Garden were the big attraction

Many downtown Boise building are heated by geothermal

A Freak Alley mural

Another with an Idaho theme

I always try yo get a garbage dumpster in for effect

THe historic Egyptian THeater

Interior of the old Boise Depot

The Big Mike Locomotive

The classic Union Pacific Depot

Back to Urgent Care on Tuesday morning where they take another look at the finger and give me a shot in the hip to fight infection and a prescription for an infection killing drug.  Also want to see me on Wednesday morning for a second shot. The muscle pain in my leg is what is really killing me today, can not walk without pain, not sure what is worse, the finger wound or the muscle pain. I am not a good sick patient, I'm in full blown hypochondriac worry mode, quite sure I have something terminal and am driving Twinkles out of her mind.

Wednesday I get another anti infection shot then go for a slow walk on the Boise Riverwalk while Twinkles goes on a 10 mile bike ride.  The muscle pain seems to be easing up, there is hope.  This has been a tough week for me, I'm ready for a change in scenery now, in spite of the pain.  Boise has been great, Twinkles is adding it to her list of potential settle down locations.

Congratulations go out to my daughter Miranda and Beth, a baby boy, that makes me a Grandfather again !

Next stop is the Riggins, Idaho area to a BLM Recreation site.

Got to keep moving on,

Twinkles and Slick

Craters of the Moon and Twin Falls, Idaho

May 29 - June 3, 2014:

It was an unusually early start for us, on the road by 8 AM as we wanted to be at "Craters of the Moon National Park" early as it is a first come , first served campground with a limited number of large RV sites.  The ride there was unusual passing through the Idaho National Laboratory which developed and has manufactured Nuclear Reactors for power generation since 1951.  Otherwise lots and lots of Potato fields, then the small town of Arco and then another twenty miles to the park entrance.  We arrived at the National Park to find plenty of camp sights available, picked one and set up.  The campground is right in the midst the lava flow, that's unique !  No hookups but there are water and decent bathroom facilities. At $5 dollars a night, senior pass, a good deal.  As usual, we check out the visitors center and watched the inspirational movie then took a quick drive around the park road. 

That's our campsite, what a view !

On Tuesday some excellent hiking was enjoyed on the Tree Molds Trail, the Broken Top Trail, the Devils Orchard Nature Trail and the Spatter Cones Trail.  This National Park is immense, covering 750,000 acres.  It has a paved seven mile loop road with numerous side trails and viewing vistas, but the majority of it is wilderness, virtually inaccessible.  It is not the usual type of Volcano, like Mt. St. Helens with lava exploding out of a cone shaped mountain.  It was created and is a work in progress by a 55 mile rift (crack) in the Earth's surface that allows magma to penetrate up near the surface and vent occasionally in lava flows.  It has a history of erupting every 2-3,000 years and it's been about 2,000 years since the last eruption. If it stays on schedule any time now, it could possibly wake up again.  I would think it is being closely monitored so I'm quite sure there would be early warning signs.  Just thinking as I am living in the midst of it ???

Lots of wild flowers growing out of the rock

That's a mold of a tree in the Lava

They call these Lava bombs, as they were shot through the air

A land of contrast between the black cinder and the green vegatation

The Lava has solidified into many unusual shapes

These tiny flowers were blooming all over

In contrast to these pure white ones

A nice view from the Tree Molds Trail

I made a trip 18 miles down the road to the nearest gas station in the town of Arco to fill up the Jeep and take a good look around.  I found a historical sign to signify that Arco was the first town in the free world to be nuclear powered in 1955. Then the old Masons sign and two classic bar signs that I had to enter to check the authenticity.  The Club Sawtooth is just an awesome name for a bar and it was friendly and had Moose Droll and Fat Tire on tap, pretty good stuff.  I then found the Mello-dee Club, another awesome bar name, a couple of blocks away, also very friendly and interesting. They both have great classic old signs.  

Downtown Arco with the graduation class dates on hillside

Atomic powered Arco 

Club Sawtooth

Mello-dee Club

Saturday was spent going on hikes on the wilderness trail and then a trail for 1 1/2 miles out across the Lava flow to Dewdrop, Boy Scout, Beauty and Indian Tunnel caves.  The canes are actually Lava tubes large enough to walk or crawl through.  There was ice on the floor inside Beauty Cave that was interesting, but the others were not that interesting to me.  The walk to them into the Lava flow was way more interesting.  We decided to go into Arco for dinner which has very limited options, we ate at the Pickle's Place, famous (so they say) for their Atomic burger, I opted instead for their hot burger sandwich and real Idaho mashed potatoes smothered with gravy.

That's me in one of the cave entrances 

Twinkles caught this beautiful flower with the iPhone 

Inside Indian Cave

The exit of Indian Cave

It's not an easy walk in places

Pickle's Place

Well, We have now seen enough lava rock and cinders for quite a while and are moving on to Twin Falls, Idaho.

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Sunday morning was a beautiful day for the move, taking route 20 west through about 20 miles of Lava fields to the town of Carey where I stop for gas and the free dump station.  We then continue southwest on route 26 to the railroad town of Shoshone where I stop to explore the old downtown a bit.  It has a very nice old Union Pacific train station, but it appears to be all freight now.  I then continue south on route 93 through nothing but nice farm country to Twin Falls.  The directions to the RV Park were a bit sketchy, to get there you have to make a turn onto an unnamed street that the GPS does not recognize.  We were tipped off by internet reviews otherwise would have been wandering around for quite some time.  The Rock Creek RV Park part of a large county park with the fast flowing Rock Creek running through the center, picnic pavilions and pit toilets.  It has electric and water connections, roomy sites, no sewer, but a dump station one mile away and convenient to downtown for $15 a night.

I had to check out this old tractor near the dump station

A welcome mural in Shoshone

The Union Pacific Depot in Shoshone

After setting up, I take a short trip a mile away to Main Street and find a "Frontier days festival" going on in the downtown park. It was the usual fair food, carnival rides, cheap sunglasses and other assorted tee shirts, hats and jewelry.  They had a number of bands playing 60-70's music and sorry to say, not that well.  Of particular interest were many fair goers eating mini donuts which strikes me as just "wrong".

The Rock Creek RV Park

Beautiful  bandshell at the festival, this was during a break
when everyone ran to get food

Typical fair food

Monday morning and we went off to see some of the local natural wonders, notably the Snake River Canyon (site of Evil Knevil's failed rocket motorcycle jump), the Perrine Bridge, Shoshone Falls and Twin Falls.  The overlook of the Snake River and canyon at the Perrine Bridge is a great sight.  The bridge is 486 feet above the Snake River which is an incredible sight on it's own.  There were a group of BASE jumpers at the bridge leaping off, which is allowed and a common sight there.  Next was a ride a few miles to the Shoshone Falls which are called the "Niagara of the west" and I would agree.  The falls drop 212 feet to the canyon floor, are incredible now, but must have been mind boggling prior to the Dam being installed. We then continued a few more miles to Twin Falls, which the city of Twin Falls gets it's name from.  The city should now change it's name as there is only a single Water Fall now since the Dam was installed. These Dams and a network of Canals provide water all over the valley for irrigation and were part of a very successful US western development strategy. Mr Perrine was an early settler who built the first bridge over the Snake River and was instrumental in building the vast irrigation canal network in the area.

The Perrine Bridge is a sight

If you zoom in, there is a BASE jumper in center with parachute open

The Twins statue 

Evil Knievel is still getting attention

There's Twinkles posing on observation deck of Shoshone Falls

Shoshone Falls are fantastic

The now single "Twin Falls"

  

A favorite activity for me in any town is looking for the good breakfast places and it's not just about the food, I also take into consideration the character of the establishment, the cleanliness, the service and even the location.  The Buffalo Cafe in Twin Falls was a winner on all counts Tuesday morning, definitely going on the recommended list.  I then wandered a while in the Warehouse district, next to the freight tracks, always another favorite areas of mine and found a few interesting subjects.  The highlight was the old Concrete Silo's, built about a hundred years ago with their nice Idaho mural scenes. 

Twin Falls logo

Cement Silo sign

Colorful freight car

Idaho license plate billboard

Historic cement silo's in warehouse district

View on the Snake River from Centennial Park

Waterfall along road to Centennial Park

Next a ride to the town of Buhl with their "Trout capital of Idaho" banners along the main drag and a huge Trout Mural on the Senior Center building on Main Street.  I was tempted to go into the "Trout Saloon" for a beer but my big breakfast was still sitting heavy in my belly.  Instead I did a strawberry creamsicle ice cream cone (one scoop) which seemed less filling ?  Buhl is big farm country with a healthy dose of outdoor recreation, camping, hunting, fishing, boating, etc.  As I rode around listening to the radio, I found a 24/7 comedy station which was simply great, just what I needed.  It is sad to say, but the comedy skits were far more accurate and enlightening than the goofy morning DJ's, the new country music and the gloom and doom politically biased news commentary. 

Does McDonalds now server Trout ?

The old Buhl theater is now a Mexican restaurant

Trout mural in Buhl

The old Buhl Elevator

Next stop is, Boise, Idaho,

Twinkles and Slick