Idaho!!!

 

Joe’s Idaho Memories

I was met at the airport in Idaho Falls by the Andersons.  I arrived a little early and waited at the curb for them to arrive.  It is a small comfortable airport that allows you to do that right outside the door.  When I saw them coming down the lane in the Armada I got excited and I saw kids inside getting excited also.  Evan, who had been very mommy clingy the last time I saw him, was waving, giving me a big smile, and easy to hug.  He, Ally, Jayce, Leah, and Shawn just filled up my spirit when I saw them all together.  We went to their home, first time I had seen it, and disembarked.  The house is so comfortable with stone and brick work all over the place.  The back yard is small and cozy and neatly done.  I got a room downstairs right by the bathroom.  I think I evicted Jayce for my stay.  There is a big entertainment room right outside my bedroom door.

An immediate attraction was the salt water fish aquarium.  It drew a lot of attention and I was amazed at home much everyone knew about the several different residents.

We drove over to the Snake River area across from the Idaho Falls Temple later in the early evening.  Ospreys were diving down to catch fish and it was important to watch your step because of the large flock of Canada Geese that were there.  I mostly enjoyed watching the kids interact with each other, just being themselves without company manners on.

Just past the Anderson backyard is a large wheat field.  It had the old fashioned irrigation system that requires workers to dismantle and move the irrigation pipes every few days.  I watched them do this task once and realized how lucky eastern wheat growers are to have rain in due season.

I walked around the development where the Andersons live.  It is new and homes are still being constructed there.  I enjoyed the no-humidity-outside time and also enjoyed checking out the different plants, both ornamental landscaping ones and the native plants growing on vacant lots.  Most of the vacant lots had a Shawn Anderson Realty sign on them.

Next day, Sunday, I used Shawn’s Maxima to drive south on I-15 to meet Eric White’s mother, Sue.  She was bringing Eric and Christy up to join us.  They had flown into Salt Lake City earlier and spent some time with her.  She and I left about the same time and met each other pretty close to the Idaho/Utah state line.  Enjoyed the drive back.  Nice to have the time with Eric and Christy.

Sunday night some friends of the Whites joined us at the Anderson house for dinner.  Leah did pork loin burritos and salad and some other stuff.  We watched the kids ride and play in a big outdoors kind of way.

Next day we loaded up both Anderson vehicles and drove to their mountain cabin at Island Park.  They have a partnership with two other members of Shawn’s family.  It seems to work out really well with all of them getting to use it about as much as they want.  Although, one of the partner’s, Shawn’s sister’s family, is in Australia with work for a year.  So, they don’t have to share with her very much :).

The cabin is big, open and very spacious feeling.  It is on three floors with bedrooms on all three as well as large game/gathering rooms on all three.  The community they live in is made up of owners who live in their own cabins—no rental property here.  Although, you can go a few roads over and there will be some rentals.  The roads are graveled, all utilities underground, and the vegetation is mostly made up of stands of lodgepole pine with various understudy plants.  Despite seeing lots of blooming plants, I never saw the first honeybee.  

The other four adults had a morning run each day we were there.  I often went walking on my own or with Jayce.  We saw a mule deer one morning.

They have four wheelers there.  One day while only Leah and the kids and I were there, we took them on a long journey through some cattle country that adjoins the residential area.  Apparently the cattle were on BLM land leased to ranchers.  We drove the four wheelers through their pastures as apparently others do all the time.  We only had to open and close gates.  It was comforting to see the good looking Angus cattle in their mid-day rest under the shade of the lodgepoles.

Another day we went down the Henry Fork of the Snake River on some rubber rafts.  I think my presence stifled some of the rough housing that Shawn and Eric would have liked to engage in.  I guess my age is showing.  I wore my blue jeans but did wear some of Shawn’s sandals.  Got sunburned feet of course.  Along the float/paddle trip we saw many moose and various water birds.  Large trout were all around us.  The stream is pretty wide but not very deep.  Some places we would get stuck on the bottom and have to disembark and drag the raft over the shallows.  We stopped about midway down and ate a picnic lunch.  It was about a 3-4 hour trip.

Another time we went to the Big Springs area that feeds the Henry Fork.  It is a small lake/big pond fed by multiple large springs of water.  It is naturally impounded in this area with the overflow becoming the Henry Fork.  Always cold, always trout water, always pretty!  There is a cabin on a hillside overlooking the impound built by a German in the early 1900s.  He lived there until very late in life.  He was very inventive.  He built the house, the furnishings and equipped it with gravity fed running water.  He also built a turbine that generated electricity for the house.

There was an entire day of touring Yellowstone Park.  We saw sooo much!  The bison herds were very large and the bulls were fighting each other all over the place—including on the highway.  We saw lots of elk, a wolf, but no grizzlies.  We saw Old Faithful erupt and also saw numerous other geysers.  We rode a lot, walked a lot, and ate out of Leah’s picnic basket.  We did not have any mosquito trouble at all.

One night at the cabin we built a fire outside and roasted hot dogs.

A highlight was attending the dinner/theater to see “Cowboys and Petticoats”.  The Andersons treated all of us.  The three Anderson kids had a ball watching the show.  It was full of old country & western classic songs done by these young players. I enjoyed the show but enjoyed watching the kids enjoy the show even more.   Someone said they thought they may be students at BYU-Idaho.

Too soon it was time to saddle up and leave for home.  Shawn and I went thru Rexburg for a real estate stop he needed to make and then on to the airport.  I LOVE THAT LITTLE AIRPORT.  We left on time.  After arriving at SLC we were delayed leaving because of storms in the Midwest.  I was a couple of hours late getting home.  On the flight to Nashville I sat by an Indian (as in, from India) who lives in Fresno, California.  He was going to Nashville for a Subway franchise meeting.  He told me he owned 12 of them in the Fresno area.  He said his mortgage payment was $25,000 per month.  Paying out that much money he said he was lucky to clear $1,000,000 per year.  Poor guy!