Quiet at the lake

It has been quiet at the lake, well at least it was quiet, and it will be quiet at the lake again — soon. Our travels have taken us south at a rapid pace with the change of seasons. Winter arrived in the west on Labor Day. Labor Day, the last day of summer isn’t supposed to be the first day of winter, but it was so. What happened to fall?

We were at Placid Lake for the first day of winter — on Labor Day. The storm produced this photo (above) which I liked so much that I just felt I needed to show it off. I don’t think I have used it before, but since it was almost a month ago, I just needed to sneak it in. It was taken the day after the snowy picture that I took and posted in our last travel blog. Here is the link, to the post and all the pictures, just in case you missed it. Stunning Big Sky

Moving Fast

Since winter hit, before any fall colors arrived, we have been moving south faster than we normally would. We traveled through Missoula Montana, cut across the rest of Montana and Idaho. We are currently north of Salt Lake, but that is a different story.

Garnet

After Missoula, we spent five days at Beavertail Hill, a Montana State Park. While we were there, besides other things, we went up the canyon to a ghost town named Garnet. I have been to several ghost towns in the past, but Garnet was really special. Most ghost towns I have been to are nothing more than foundations, really just piles of rocks, in the shape of foundations. Most everything has been removed or just blew away in the wind. Garnet was very intact.

Gold mining was the source of the boom which happened far later than similar booms in Colorado and California. In 1893 Garnet was a boomtown and the population was more than 1,000 by 1895. By 1905 the easy gold was gone and the population dropped to about 150. There was a new boom in 1934 but the war effort eliminated the mining use of dynamite so again the population moved on.

Garnet has some very beautiful houses, saloons, hotels, and the schoolhouse is still all standing just as if they were occupied only a few years ago. One of the things we learned is that almost every house was a log cabin, but the most successful owners covered their log houses with siding.

Helena

We had the choice of stopping in Helena for a few days or we could have continued in the woods. Since we needed a laundry stop — Helena was the winner. We had a good time in Helena. The problem with the stop was the horrible air quality caused by the fires in California and Oregon. After we got the laundry all done we left. While there, we made a visit to the capitol building which everyone said was very beautiful, they were right.

So the next morning, the day after we visited the capitol building, we set out south for Idaho. We were going to Idaho anyway. Instead of slowly departing and stopping for a night along the way, we cracked off 270 miles. We picked up two extra days at the lake (picture at the top).

Again I know that most RVers don’t consider 270 miles to be a big day, but we do even though our new RV is so smooth it makes the trip so easy. I didn’t buy it to drive it — I got it to go places and driving is part of the plan. Some of our RV friends (road buddies) just did 900 miles in a single day. Crazy!

Rigby

We had been to Rigby before, but this year picked a new campground with easy access to the water. Everything is a trade-off. Easy access to the water was this choice. Last year we were outside of town and had a 200-300 foot cliff between us and the water.

Here is a link to our post while we stayed in Idaho exactly one year prior only about 10 miles from our current campground. More hunting in Idaho The pictures in that post are so beautiful.

Rigby is a small town just north of Idaho Falls. Our spot is just to the north of town. For us, the lake was the attraction. It is so nice to park the RV and drop the kayaks in the water, right in front of the RV.

I mentioned our ideal parking spot is with our kayaks right on the water, in front of the RV. Getting a picture of both the RV and the kayaks requires wading (which I did once – just for the picture, but not this time). In this picture, however, you will just have to imagine the kayaks. We had the lake almost to ourselves, except on the weekend, and it was quiet at the lake.

By looking at this picture you can tell we had lots of sun. It was reflecting off the water, directly into our window. Notice that the front window is has a silver tint to it. This is a huge sheet of foil. It does a good job of keeping the inside of the RV much cooler. When we don’t put it in the window, the window really lets the heat in.

Idaho Falls

While there we met up with friends from San Diego, who we met RVing in Oregon. Bill and Kathy were in Grand Teton and they timed their arrival in Idaho to be at the lake the same time we were going to be there. Bill and Kathy have been a big influence for us pertaining to picking our current RV, and we couldn’t be happier. It is so cool that we get to spend three weeks at the same campgrounds in Idaho and Utah. We both are moving south, just ahead of the weather.

We were able to take Bill and Kathy to Idaho Falls and show off the namesake falls. We had dinner at the brewery (Snow Eagle Brewing Company) — right on the sidewalk across the street from the falls. Bill and Kathy were happy that unlike at Klamath Falls (which we both searched for the falls) Idaho Falls (the town) — was actually named for a real waterfall.

Construction of the Idaho Falls Power plant, just above the waterfall, makes the waterfalls at Idaho Falls about a half-mile wide. What it doesn’t have in terms of vertical drop, it makes up for in width.

Quiet at the lake

Fall temperatures were really starting to dictate our activities. We didn’t kayak in the morning but instead, we went out right before sunset. On most days it was perfect when the wind died off at sunset so we could go for an evening paddle. The lake is small and we could easily make a lap right after dinner. If the photographer was better, this would have made a great picture of Tami in her kayak just after sunset. Someday, maybe I will improve my photography skills. You can see from this photo it is quiet at the lake.