Road Trip!

It’s all a road trip, I know. We love that we get to be spontaneous, and on Sunday, we bolted from the Tetons for a road trip within the road trip. Our buds Yancy, Brad and Bliss invited us to Island Park, Idaho for Labor Day Weekend. We hemmed and hawed about what we were going to do—go? stay? After confirming that the Minnie was in fact legal to stay at the house they were renting with friends, we hit the road at 6:30am Sunday.

The awesome part about this mini road trip is that our route took us back through Yellowstone! As we pulled out of the campground, a beautiful bull moose with a rack half-covered in velvet was enjoying his breakfast. We saw two more moose as we headed north, which made us incredibly happy because we had not seen any moose when we were in Yellowstone. Oh, did I forget to mention the massive bull that visited our campground the night before? Turns out, the campground stood between him and the river so he strolled right through, scaring the heck out of a couple of guys enjoying their PBRs by the campfire. 

Four hours later, we arrived in Island Park—a town that is 35 miles long. Kind of crazy. It was freezing! Nobody was out on the reservoir enjoying the last days of summer. Instead, we hung out inside and laughed for about ten straight hours. It was a wonderful twenty-four hours. We were in need of time with people that know us. The story of the Minnie and our life is an awesome one that we don't mind telling, yet, with new folks that we meet on the road, it can feel like we are telling the same story over and over again, because we are telling the same story over and over again. With Brad and Yancy, and Bliss, and their friends who are now our friends, the conversation was different and rich and thought-provoking and hilarious! 

Monday morning, then, we had a decision to make: return to the Tetons and hike some more or head towards Ketchum, Idaho to see dear friends from SF who would be traveling through. In need of more time with people that know us, we opted for Ketchum, though we took the long route. 

After an oil change (gotta keep the Minnie in tip top shape!) and some resupplying in Rexburg, we headed north towards Salmon, but stopped short because of the winter weather warnings issued for the area. We camped alongside Birch Creek, which provided us with an excellent soundtrack by which to fall asleep. The clouds drifted in and out occasionally parting so we could see the snow on the peaks. By this morning the storms had passed, and we lingered with our coffee and breakfast before we set off for Salmon, then down to Challis, eventually winding up in Stanley, one of my favorite places on this planet. Alanna declared the drive the prettiest we had done to date, especially from Salmon south as the road follows the almighty Salmon River through stunning peaks of volcanic rock. We stopped to play for a bit in the hot springs in Sunbeam, which gave our feet a much needed soak. Come to find out, reflexology is hard to find outside the City, so we’ve been suffering! 

Tonight, we are camped near Stanley Lake, with the awe-inspiring Sawtooth Mountains as our backdrop. We tent camped in this area over a decade ago and it was a cold rainy miserable experience, for Alanna, who was new to camping. It was years before she would even consider camping again. Thanks goodness for the Minnie and her heater. 

Tomorrow, we’ll follow the Salmon to its headwaters then head over the Galena summit and drop into Ketchum. We have other friends in the Wood River Valley as well, so we plan to spend some good time here catching up with everyone, and doing a little bit of work. More on that later.

When you're as big as this moose you don't have to worry about walking through a campground... Everyone will jump out of your way and then try to take a picture.