Boise Road Trip

Memorial Day weekend this year was a road trip to Boise, or specifically: Kuna, Idaho and my sister's place Whiskey Creek West.

The occasion was my nephew's high school graduation--a big moment! Mom flew out from Ohio and we had a nice time hanging out together.

Here I am sipping whiskey with my mom who is 78 and amazing:

My sister, nephew, and mom squinting in to the setting sun . . . we're standing on a foot bridge over the Boise River which was in flood stage:

Memorial Day was my last full day there. We'd already ridden that morning, on Archie, my sister's three year old warm blood. I was restless to get out and we couldn't agree on where to go so I decided to do a mini road trip. The Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area stood out when I looked at the map. It's just south of my sister's ranch, and I had been to part of it before, but it was such a big area that I thought I'd explore more. 

Despite the map showing little roads, they turned out to be mostly private country lanes. My anticipated 90 minute excursion (I planned to include some kind of short hike) turned into a solid three hour, 135 mile driving loop around the whole area. This included some long stretches of dirt roads. 

Mostly it was fun and it's always nice to be out with my puppy Jake. It was a gorgeous day. 

The Snake River and my furthest point on the three hour loop at Grand View, Idaho:

The most surreal thing I saw was at the Idaho Army National Guard's training center in Orchard, Idaho--which isn't much of a town, just a few buildings.

I have no photographic evidence but I saw some big army trucks, humvees, and two tanks. And when I say I saw these things they were all operational and rolling down the road. It felt like I'd stumbled into a war zone, or the scene from a bad novel. Seeing the tanks rolling along was jarring. 

Other sites along the way:

• Shooting ranges
• Free range cattle
• An old Spartan trailer, in the town of Kuna
• And a lot of wide open space

I was in my VW TDI which I plan to write about separately as I turn it in to Volkswagen in less than a week thanks to VW's cheating software.

Huge congrats to my nephew John on reaching this big milestone.

Monte, my sister's Cleveland Bay colt in front of the setting sun at Whiskey Creek West.