More pictures from Ketcham

 Sheep Parade


 Dog Trials



 Craters of the Moon

 Craters of the Moon, Looks like snow.
 Elk on the mountains

 Deer in the yard
 Racoons on the way home from the movies


 Fence at Ketcham
 Baldy
 Tables at Johney Gs
 Hemmingway Memorial in Sun Valley

Sun Valley ID

 Sun Valley Lodge


 Anne Barnhardt
 Wiffenpoofs
 Bill and Tom Allred
 Big Wood River
 Wood River lodge Ski Lift
 Brian Casserly of Cornet Chop Suey
 Parking lot at River Run Lodge
 Titan Hot Seven
 Glenn Crytzer and his Syncopators
 Trailing of the Sheep Parade

 Sheep Wagon




 

Our next destination was Sun Valley ID, founded by Averell Harriman in 1936, where we attended the Trailing of the Sheep Festival and the Sun Valley Jazz Festival. We arrived in the valley a week early and explored the hot springs, and the scenic highways. We took a day and went south to the Craters of the Moon National Monument, where we drove the 7 mile loop road taking  in the many volcanic features. The basaltic lava fields are the largest in the mainland US they seemed to come up out of the ground instead of from a high volcano.

The restaurants in Sun Valley were in Slack season, the time between summer and ski season, and were running great specials for the locals. We took advantage of some of them and enjoyed the food and atmosphere.  The homes in Sun Valley are very elegant, a great many of them on the market for “millions”.

The weather was getting cold at night so we spent the week at an RV park just south of Ketchum where we had full hook ups. We spent some time just driving around gawking. There are elk on the hills and I saw some deer in the well manicured yards.

Friday we moved to River Run Ski Lodge Parking Lot where we would spend the next 10 days with the Airstream Rally. On Friday evening, as part of the Lamb festival 7 of the downtown restaurants had free lamb tastings. We only had time to make it to 3 of them but just at those three we had a complete meal, including wine.  Saturday we spent the day in Hailey, a town of about 8,000 people, 11 miles south of Ketchum, There was a craft fair there with all things lamb, sheep shearing, lots of beautiful knitted and woven items, beautiful hats, and the usual craft fare. Also there to entertain us were the Peruvian musicians and dancers, Oinkari Basque dancers and Boise Highlander Bagpipers. We also attended the sheep dog trials; it’s amazing to watch those well trained dogs follow their masters’ orders. The parade was Sunday and 1500 sheep were herded down Main Street by the dogs, there were also dance troupes and bands but there was a long wait between acts. River Run Ski Lodge is a very classy ski lodge for skiers to go tramping in with their skis and wet clothes. They opened up their showers to the RV’ers who were there for the festival, this helped us keep our water and grey water tanks in working order, it was also one of the venues  the bands  played at.

  Well the Jazz Festival is here at last! I wasn’t quite sure we would be thrilled with 6 days of jazz, but as it turned out we absolutely loved it! It is just great American music played by true artists. There was live music performed by 180 musicians in 260 concerts over a five day period. There was also a special concert for the RV’ers on Tuesday before the official start of the festival. The venues were very classy places, The Sun Valley Lodge. The Sun Valley Inn, The Opera House Theater, River Run Lodge, the indoor ice rink where they put a floor over the ice, and Satchmo’s.  The theater played free old jazz movies all day Wed. We went to “IT HAPPENED IN SUN VALLEY”. There were dance lessons for those who cared to shake a leg and it was fun to watch them on the dance floors, which most venues had.

We had planned to stay out and head south from here but I have developed a tooth problem that needs a root canal. So we decided to come home and get a few medical problems taken care of. I’m planning to have a knee replacement in Florida this year if I can work out the appointments and the insurance. It’s been a great summer, hope to see you all soon.

Boise to Stanley

 Camped at Kirkham Hot Springs
 Pioneer Cemetery

 Stanleys fences
 Yankee Fork Dredge






 On Fourth of July Road we saw our best Fall Color.
The road is called Fourth of July because it often can't be opened until then.


 

 

 

We left Boise for the mountains again and another scenic highway, we only drove 70 miles to Mountain View NFCG.  After we parked we went 4 miles up the road and found Kirkham NFCG campground with a beautiful hot springs that even I could get to. It had paved sites and if we ever get here again it will be a destination! From this location we found 4 more hot springs and Norm tried them all. Sunday the 30^th of Sept already, We traveled south on Rt 21 to Idaho City, a cute little mining town from the 1800s. At its heyday it was the largest city in Idaho with over 6000 inhabitants. It is still set up as if it were in the 1800s with saloons, ice cream parlors, museums, and a pioneer cemetery.  We decided to move to Kirkham Campground for 1 night, It is a lot busier than Mountain View with people coming to use the Hot Springs. We decided we liked the CG a few miles away from all the action!

Oct 1

Stanley ID was our next stop. It is a beautiful  little town in the Sawtooth Mountains that is a buzz in the summer but fairly sleepy this time of year. People come here for rafting trips, hiking, and camping. It has miles and miles of wooden zigzag fences I’ll try to include a picture of them. We drove to a gold ghost town that still had an abandoned  gold dredge sitting in the creek just where it was left 80 years ago. There were also two hot springs in the Salmon River, one being built by the CCC Corps, Sunbeam Hot Springs.

  Norm got a new Aussie hat in Stanley.

“Wearing Many Hats”    This is a well- known metaphor for having many duties or jobs. Historically headwear was an important element of working apparel.

Keeping something under your hat means keeping a secret.   Back in the day, people kept important papers and other valuables  there for safe keeping. It’s said that Abraham Lincoln  found this practice useful.

A 10 gallon hat does not hold 10 gallons of anything. The word “galon” in Spanish refers to a band on a hat. In yesteryear, the more galons on a hat, the more expensive it was, and a hat with 10 galons was impressive. Cowboys took the phrase Ten-Gallon to describe a hat that was large and expensive.