A Full-time Life

SCENIC IDAHO

 

This week's pictures, nearly the end of the road-trip,  are all from the State of Idaho.   We've spent quite a bit of time in that State  over the years (both of us grew up in a tiny town in Washington State that borders  Northern  Idaho) and we have camped in  and traveled through parts of it many times in our life.     But surprisingly on this trip we found several new and interesting places to explore.

 

 

This is Shoshone Falls on the Snake River near the town of Twin Falls.   I love waterfalls and Shoshone Falls was stunning.  We don't know why we'd never visited  before, as we have driven through that town several times in the past.    The contrast between the swiftly flowing water and the rugged Idaho landscape was fascinating.

 

 

The Park area above the Falls was donated to the city of Twin Falls by the ranchers who owned the land, for the purpose of public enjoyment -- and of course we were not the only members of the public doing just that on this day.

 

 

Among all the other tourists there was also a group of plein-air painters set up at various points around the Falls.  It was fun to sneak a peek over their shoulders to see the various artistic interpretations.   (I'm more than happy to let my camera interpret for me.)

 

 

We saw these petroglyphs  in the Snake River canyon near the tiny town of Melba. Humans have lived in this area for at least 10,000 years.   We walked the trail to try to see some of the etchings left on the rocks.  They are quite faded and hard to see and the trail was fairly rugged, so I'm sure we missed a lot.

 

 

We visited the World Center for Birds of Prey near Boise.  Naturalists at the Center are among those working to re-introduce California Condors into the wild.  This vulture, the largest flying bird in North America is also the most endangered bird on our continent.  Although ancestors of the bird were alive during prehistoric times, by 1982 only 22 of the species remained.  All of these were placed in captive breeding programs at that time.   Most of the young condors born here in Idaho are released near the Grand Canyon.   

Today, the greatest danger to the newly wild condors are lead bullets.  Because the condors eat only dead animals, they may ingest particles of lead in animals left by hunters.   There is a push to stop the sale of leaded bullets, but I believe they are still being sold.   In addition to breeding condors for release, this Center also treats sick condors for rehabilitation.

 

 

 

This pretty little Kildeer was among several wild birds we saw on the grounds of the Center.   At 9 inches or so, it looked awfully small  after we had just gazed at the Condors which have over a 9-foot wing-span.  

 

 

There were lots of reasons to be glad we spent some time in Idaho on this trip.  And this amazing rainbow upstream from Shoshone Falls was definitely not the least of them.

 

 

LINKING this week to:  OUR WORLD on Tuesday; MOSAIC MONDAY; ALL SEASONS; NATURE NOTES; THROUGH MY LENS; WILD BIRD WEDNESDAY; SIGNS SIGNS; SKYWATCH FRIDAY; SATURDAY CRITTERS; and RATHER B'BIRDING.  

 

Thank you to the hosts for making these wonderful sharing opportunities available to all of us.

 

SILVER CITY

 

 Twenty-six rocky uphill dirt-road miles from the already-remote Oregon town of Jordan Valley Oregon lies the sort-of ghost town of Silver City Idaho.  "Sort-of" because while the town looks like it did in the late 1800s, the structures are all privately owned and some of them are occupied, mostly as summer homes.

 

Remains of Wells Fargo Express office

 

 The whole town is on the National Register of Historic Places -- and the outsides of the buildings can't be modernized or altered.   There's no electricity, but other modern conveniences can be added to the insides of the structures.

Silver City was founded in 1864 after silver was discovered on nearby War Eagle mountain.  Soon it was a bustling little community of 2500 people with 75 businesses and was even the county seat  for a few years.

 

Idaho Standard School

 Although mining never did come to a complete halt, the original War Eagle mine became depleted and financing for other mines failed.    As agriculture in the lower valleys grew in importance with the advent of irrigation, population in this extremely remote mountain town declined steadily and by the 1930s it was a nearly unoccupied ghost town.    

 

Former Silver City Saloon

 

 A kind of revival began after World War II when transportation became more available and visitors to the area increased.  Property owners and Owyhee County have worked hard for many years to preserve intact this remnant of Western history.  

 Today there are just a few businesses on the old Main Street... a small inn/ restaurant  (where they cook using propane gas),  a souvenir shop, and a campground.  But no grocery store or gas station.  

 

 

Deadman Alley and Sommercamp Saloon

 

 Every old-west town has to have a street that was the scene of  gunfights and stabbings and  Silver City is no exception.

  

 

 

Getting off the beaten track on roadtrips is a fun part of OUR WORLD, so this post is linked there.  Thank you to the hosts.

SCENIC IDAHO

 

 We spent a little time in Idaho mountain country on our summer roadtrip.  We were in Owyhee County, up above 6180 feet.

 

 

 

 Wildflowers were everywhere.  This is rocky mountain soil, but the flowers are valiant.   They thrive in spite of the conditions.

 

The roads were dusty, but the air was crisp and clear and  the scenery was worth it.  

 

 

 

 Linking to Gemma's SCENIC WEEKENDS and Mary's MOSAIC MONDAY.  Thank you!!

WATER .... OR NOT

 

These drive-by photos from the State of Idaho, taken on the same day ... and within not very many miles ... illustrate what water (here in the form of irrigation) can do.  Or perhaps better stated, what farmers cannot do when they lack it.

 

 

Idaho farmland

I don't know much of anything about the politics or ecology of water and irrigation, but it is always a marvel to see how irrigation turns acres of sagebrush into acres of useable farmland.

 

 

Fern Ridge Lake

 

Water, or the shortage of it, is on our minds now that we have arrived at our summer destination.    Our RV Park is on a reservoir which is primarily used for flood-control and farmland irrigation.  Recreation on the Lake is (as it should be) a secondary purpose.    

Early last Spring (way before we got here) there were heavy rains in this area that filled the Lake to capacity.  Anticipating more rain, as is usual here throughout the spring,  the Army Corps of Engineers began the slow process of draining the reservoir.  (If the water gets let out too fast, it would flood farms downstream.)  But the rains didn't arrive as scheduled.  (Weather can be funny that way.)  

 

Channel, Fern Ridge Lake

 

So the Lake is too shallow for  boating and parts of it (as in the middle picture above) are even too shallow for birds and fish.  But there are still great views in some places and it is still a lovely place to spend the summer.    

 

Linked to NATURE NOTES at Michelle's Rambling Woods.  

HUNGRY

 

Between beautiful Colorado and beautiful Idaho we had to travel through a desolate windy stretch of Wyoming where we spent one night.  

So on arriving in Montpelier Idaho, we were thrilled to be able to park the RoadTrek next to this lovely little stream.

The peace and quiet (and cool) would really have been enough, but in addition we were enormously entertained by a family of newly-fledged robins right outside our door.

 

  

 

 Robins are a very common backyard bird in the western states, but not so much in Florida.  (I'm not enough of an expert to say they are never there, but I've never seen one or heard anyone talking about them.)  When we wintered on the Texas gulf coast years ago, expert birders were all excited one day because they'd seen one.  At first, I thought they were joking because at the time I assumed robins were common everywhere.

 

 These Idaho babies must have fledged very recently because they really really wanted their mother to feed them.  Even though they were pretty much the same size as she was.   Can't you almost hear this one yelling "feed me"?  

Mom would hop over to a patch of grass, apparently trying to show the babies where the worms were.  She was pretty good at ignoring their pitiful cries!

Just like our first annual glimpse of the mountains,   these common birds that aren't so common to us any more felt like a welcome back!

***

For WILD BIRD WEDNESDAY.  Thanks to Stewart.

 

 

 

BEYOND HOPE

This is a Flashback post to a few years ago when we traveled through Idaho on our way from visiting family in the Northwest to spending the winter somewhere warmer and drier.

Thanks to Lesley at Signs Signs, we now have a spot to put our signs, which we've been collecting over quite a few years of RV traveling. 

 

Beyond Hope sounds dire -- but actually it was the name of a very nice RV resort just outside of (beyond) the tiny town of Hope Idaho, near Pend Orielle Lake. 

 

It really was a very pretty spot -- there were  deer, rabbits and wild turkeys all over.  This one decided to take a rest just outside of where our RV was parked.  The resort had a very nice restaurant on site, plus views of the lovely Lake. 

 

 

ROADTRIP Part 2 - SOUTH DAKOTA TO OREGON, June 2008

The first night out of Loveland, we stayed in Cabela's RV Park beside the chain's flagship store in Sidney, Nebraska.  It is hard to remember the name of the town because we were just calling it Cabela, Nebraska.  The store and corporate offices are way bigger than the tiny town and people drive from miles around to work here. Cabela's is a big sportsman's chain that started in Sydney.  Each of their huge stores feature a fresh-water aquarium of local sports fish and a diorama display of (stuffed) game animals.   It was an ok full hook up rv park for an overnight stop--walking to the store and browsing the aisles was a fun and different way to do our usual evening walk. 

We were heading for South Dakota, where we had to be before August to renew our drivers' licenses (we've been residents for five years now and that's how many years the license lasts).    Click here for information about our South Dakota residency: 

http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/traveling_home/2008/03/a-south-dakota.html

As long as we were in the state on our "official business", we checked out these two favorite spots:

http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/traveling_home/2008/06/custer-state-park-south-dakota.html

http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/traveling_home/2008/06/chief-crazy-horse-monument.html

In the Spring or summer, after we stay in Colorado (and then South Dakota this time) we head to the Northwest to visit family and old friends.  To get there, it is necessary to drive through part of the State of Wyoming (which I usually spell WHYoming -- as in WHY do we have to be here?)  Yes, poor Wyoming is not my favorite State.  Part of it is not really the State's fault -- by the time we've visited our kids in Colorado, we are ready to be in Oregon and Washington visiting the rest of them.  The adventure is kind of gone at this point and we need a jetpack!  But the other part of it is that this state (other than the beautiful Teton/Yellowstone corner) is really not very scenic AT ALL. 

 

 

 

 

Usually, when you cross a stateline there isn't any obvious difference at all from one side to the next.  But when we left Custer in SD we dropped down in altitude and, as we crossed the border into Whyoming, the terrain changed immediately from the lovely Black Hills into dry and uninteresting high desert country.  And there were a lot of open pit coal mines -- pretty horrible to look at, in my opinion.  We have a bit of a disagreement about this though.  Bill agrees that they're not beautiful, but he would very much like to tour one to see how they operate.  I'd rather try to pretend they aren't really there.  Someday, we probably will take that tour -- and then I will learn something in spite of myself. 

The Wyoming terrain is apparently perfect for pronghorn antelope.  We see hundreds of them on any trip through the state.  Although wildlife watching is one of our joys, there are so many pronghorn that we now often don't even bother to comment.  It would be like saying "there's a cow."  Wildlife has to be little bit hard to spot for watching it to be a sport!

Our first overnight stop in Wyoming was in Casper.  We wanted to visit the Teton plant, so that we could save shipping costs on some parts we needed for our rolling home.   When  we picked it up from the factory two years ago --  and when we visited the city to tour the plant a few years before that -- we had stayed at a little RV Park called Fort Caspar.  That park is on the North Platte River and it is next door to a historical museum.    It's not a bad place to stay at all because of the river.  This year, it was full and we had to stay at a nearby KOA.  We aren't crazy about KOAs -- they are expensive and usually not in the most scenic part of an area.  One reason they cost so much is that they have a lot of activities for families.  This probably makes it worth the extra expense when you're camping with kids, but we don't care about game rooms and so forth, so those are wasted amenities for us.    At least it was just for one night. 

The next night we were in Rock Springs, where we also had to stay in a KOA.  This is Independence Rock, one of our rest stops during our 243-mile day between Casper and Rock Springs.  (I have mentioned that we don't rush our road trips, haven't I?)  Independence Rock, which is on the Emigrant Trail, was called that because wagon trains heading from Missouri to Oregon or California needed to make it to this landmark by July 4 in order to reach their final destination before it snowed in the mountains.  It was a tradition for emigrants to carve their names in this granite rock.  It's an easy climb and there's a big parking area-rest stop right near the rock, so it's a great short stop for us.

We shared the rest stop with several big busloads of kids on a summer camp experience along the Trail.   All of them were wearing pioneer clothing.  It was cute to see -- they looked authentic, except for their modern running shoes. 

We had a three-state day when we left Rock Springs.  We almost never travel over 250 miles or so in a day, so a three-stater isn't at all common when we're in the West.  But we breezed  through Utah and spent the next night in Declo, Idaho at a very nice RV Park.  Lovely family-owned and run park called Village of the Trees.  It was aptly named.  There was even a small fishing lake with a walking path around it.  The park was next to the beautiful Snake River and it was amazingly quiet, even though it was just yards off of Highway I-84.    Wish they could all be this nice.   http://www.villageoftreesrvresort.com

We actually might have been tempted to stay another night at this park and explore some of the surrounding area -- but we were eager to get to Oregon.  Maybe another time.  It's a travel dilemma -- so many new places we want to see, so many old places we'd like to visit again.

ALONG THE SIDE OF THE ROAD

  When we're traveling, we take the back roads as often as we possibly can.  It's always more interesting than the freeway and sometimes you stumble across something so crazy-wonderful that you just have to jump out and take a picture.  How could you resist this record-breaker?  The world's largest ball of twine is on Main Street in Cawker, Kansas. 

I guess collecting string is as good a thing to do as any if you live in nearly deserted Cawker.      

Cawker is pretty close to the middle of the country.  But the actual exact center is in Lebanon, Kansas.  That's the marker on the left.

Here are a couple other interesting places for short stops.  Both are a little more touristy and a lot more well-known than Cawker.  But just about as kitschy. 

This is the Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota.  All surfaces of the building, including temple-like domes, are artistically covered with dried corn and other area crops.  There's been a different theme each year.  Except I recently read that last year they couldn't redecorate because of the terrible drought conditions of 2006. 

For some reason, until we visited, I'd always thought that the Palace was just a decorated facade, but it is actually a fully-functioning meeting/convention/entertainment arena. 

http://www.roadsideamerica.com/attract/SDMITcorn.html

Wall Drug in Mitchell, SD, is a hoot.  Jackalopes, animatronic bands, western gifts, fake TRex, and all.  It was fun to read about this family business though.  The owner of this little country drug store wasn't doing too well way out here in the sticks.  His wife suggested he offer free ice water as a way to entice highway travelers to stop and through word of mouth, the business took off.  Now the store offers a lot more entertainment.  And a lot of things to buy that you wouldn't necessarily expect to see at a drug store.  But they still offer the free ice water.   Wall Drug signs show up all over the world.

http://www.walldrug.com/

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Spud Break!  This sign on the school grounds at Fremont, Idaho made us slam on the brakes.  We knew, of course, about "Idaho's Famous Potatoes" and we knew it was harvest time because the very air smelled like a potato cellar as we drove that day. We did not know that harvest-time is still such a big deal in the area that school lets out so the kids can help. 

HOPE

We hope everybody is enjoying beautiful spring weather.  It is so lovely here in Port Aransas.  We came across these funny pictures about Hope when we were browsing photo files for animal and bird pictures for the albums.

This is the name of a very nice Idaho RV resort where we stayed for a few days one fall.  (Probably I should have stood under the sign for full visual impact.)  The resort is in a woodsy setting and is actually just a few miles outside of the tiny town of Hope, near beautiful Pend Orielle Lake.  So the name isn't really a comment on anyone's state of mind.  Here's a picture of what the RV spaces look like at the resort:

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On another trip, somewhere in Kentucky, we passed by this sign.  If I had to pick a cemetery, I'd want one that offered more than just a little hope, wouldn't you?

I hope we don't have to worry about that for quite a while though!