One thing we have not managed to do as much of as we'd like since we got to Idaho is go camping. We finally managed to squeeze in an overnighter a few weekends ago, though, (actually, it was a while ago now - it's taken forever to get to this) and now we're just mad at all the time we haven't spent camping!
It was the first really nice weekend we'd had, and you couldn't stuff another person in the campgrounds. In fact, I think we were quite lucky to find a spot.
Even though there were lots of people, it wasn't hard to get away from them. They were all very well behaved, too - no late night partiers. This is a good thing, because I'm pretty sure my times of late night partying have been consigned to the memoir I haven't written.
It was a very pretty campground, too, perched right along the banks of a river, which made it easy for the kids who were there to get themselves wet and for the bigger kids (ones about the shape and size of Daniel) to go fishing. Apparently the water was still fabulously cold.
Because we hadn't been to this area before, we went on an exploratory drive to see what we could see...
We saw mountain meadows:
A detour sign (seriously - they were rebuilding a bridge in the middle of the bush):
And on our way back to camp, we saw this amazing waterfall:
We had some company at our camp in the form of about ten very curious and not at all concerned about our prescence ground squirrels. I'm not sure what species they were, but I can tell you they are related to chipmunks - which we also saw a few of. Cute little buggers, aren't they? They're also pretty noisy.
This next photo is out of focus, but I have to post it anyway. These two juvenile ground squirrels were just so entertaining, and more than happy to pose for a photo. I was cursing the fact that I'm still learning about the camera when I downloaded this at home.
Daniel took his mountain bike and fishing gear and made good use of both of them, while yours truly read and went for gentle walks.
I also took some photos, such as this one. I'm intrigued by birds in flight, and I'm discovering that it's possible to catch a pretty decent photo if I'm paying attention, and if the camera's digital, because then it doesn't matter how many tries it takes me to get a photo! This is, I think, some form of wren and I like the way there's a whole lot of blue sky around the tiny little bird.
After dinner on Satuday night, we went for stroll in the long, long twilight they have in the summer here in search of the boiling spring after which the camp ground is named. Unfortunately we couldn't get right up to it; there's a cabin there which people can rent, and the signs ask you to respect their privacy. We did, however, get to see where the (literally) boiling spring met the river.
Pretty nifty, huh? It was also about 9:30pm when Daniel took this.
On Sunday, Daniel proved his camp cooking mettle by making us a delicious breakfast (scrambled eggs and ham for me).
We took a very leisurely drive home along all sorts of narrow, twisty back roads - none of which were sealed - and I have to report that the Toyota got its first scrapes.... Had to happen eventually, I guess. We also met this doe on the way home. She's a mule deer, which is the most common species around here, and wasn't at all surprised by us. We got to watch her for quite a few minutes before she finally decided she'd had enough (I imagine we were pretty smelly) and took off.
All in all, it was a good weekend. And I'm delighted to report that I can apparently still sleep on the ground (on a mat) without having to pay too dearly for it - a little (okay, a bit more than a little) first-thing-in-the-morning achiness notwithstanding.
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