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Washington Coast to Wyoming

with a visit to Idaho

By Time2Geaux Unplugged

September 20^th, 2020

“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”―J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

After the wedding we headed north to visit Washington State and then east to meet friends near Yellowstone. We have visited Washington State before but not with the camper so we wanted to retrace some of our vacation footsteps at a pace we could enjoy taking our time. Afterwards we planned to head east and meet the other couples we had planned to travel to Alaska with. Since that trip got canned we wanted to spend some time with them and enjoy the North West and cooler temperatures.

Washington Coast

We crossed the Colombia River north of Portland after spending a night so our daughter could catch a flight back home after the wedding. Most things were closed in Portland either as part of COVID or the BLM protest but we did manage to find a pub for dinner. The city block size book store I wanted to visit was closed so that will have to be another trip.

We crossed the Colombia into Washington and stayed at Fort Desperate State Park where Lewis & Clark camped after reaching the Pacific Ocean. We enjoyed the history and the tide pools we were able to explore at low tide.

We then moved north to Olympia National Park seashore to explore the stunning coastline. We had stopped by while on vacation and been wanting to go back every since.

We cut our plans short since Victoria was closed to US travelers and headed to Mount Rainer.

Tidal pool at Fort Desperate State Park, WA

Mount Rainer, Washington

We plotted our course from the coast and made sure we made a stop by Mount Rainer. We were lucky to find a Harvest Host outside the west gate of Rainer and spend several nights there. It was a Ukrainian restaurant and farm, and we got our first taste of Ukrainian cuisine, quite nice but different.

We drove into the park and hiked around Paradise. The road was still blocked with snow after Paradise so that limited our options. We did make some hikes on snow covered trails to alpine lakes. We had the trails to ourselves!

Christine Falls, Mount Ranier National Park, WA

Paradise Lodge, Mount Ranier National Park, WA

Reflection Lake, Mount Ranier National Park, WA

JoAnn hiking Snow Lake trail, Mount Ranier National Park, WA

Craters of the Moon, Idaho

Traveling back towards Wyoming we took Hwy 20 across Idaho above the Snake River basin where most of the people in Idaho live. In fact, the potatoes that Idaho is so famous for are grown in the basin. Route 20 was once a shortcut on the Oregon trail, but was known to be extremally challenging. After our visit to Craters of the Moon we understood why! Craters is really a recent, in geological terms volcanic fizzer field that oozed, splattered and spat magma out on the surface several thousand years ago. It looked a giant turned up fresh chunks of dirt for a garden except it is rock. I have visited a lot of volcanic activity in the west and saw nothing like this!

The Apollo astronauts did some geology training at Craters because this was the best example of what they should look for when identifying volcanic activity that had not been subjected to erosion. Scenes from some movies like Star Wars have also been filmed here. This place looks like no other place on earth.

Craters of the Moon National Park, Idaho

Inferno Cone, Craters of the Moon National Park, Idaho

Jeff on Inferno Cone, Craters of the Moon National Park, Idaho

Boondocking in the Tetons, Wyoming

We meet our friends in a boondocking campsite in the Bridger-Teton National Forest. The road up was bad but it had the most amazing view of the Grand Tetons, better than any paid site I had ever been in! Accommodations were tight and there was a five-day limit due to its popularity but with such a spectacular view it is understandable. We meet lots of fellow campers coming and going, from couples full-timing in vans to people renting a class C drivable RV for a week to several girls camping in tents alone, it was an interesting mix. Just so happen that our some of our family were in the area and camping also, we invited Cindy and Glynn to join us and were thrilled they came. We spent the evenings around the camp fire, having a movie night and the company and view was outstanding.

We also got a chance to put the inflatable kayaks in the Snake River and flow from the dam downstream. What a wonderful place to kayak, nice flow with such picturesque scenery. We also got to see such nice wildlife and JoAnn was able to capture some nice shots.

Mormon Settlement, Grand Teton National Park

Movie Night boondocking in Bridger-Teton NF

Teton View boondocking in Bridger-Teton NF

Kayaking on Snake River, Grand Teton NP, Wyoming

Teton View campsite, Bridger-Teton NF, Wyoming

Yellowstone National Park

I don’t know if you can ever get tired to visiting Yellowstone. The crowds had grown exponentially, I guess people had waited all spring and had cabin fever… let’s hope that’s the only fever they had! Some were wearing mask but most were acting like situation normal, full steam ahead.

Anytime you visit Yellowstone expect to drive, a lot! Things are so spread out that you have to be ready for some seat time between sights, and hope there isn’t too many animal jams. That is when some wildlife is close enough to the road to cause motorist to slow down to a crawl or even stop to get ‘that shot’ with their cellphone. They look like they are working on composing a shot for National Geographic or worse, trying to get a selfie with a bison or bull elk. Earlier that week a woman had been injured when a bison flipped her after she got too close.

We took our friends who hadn’t visited the park with us to some of our favorites like Mammoth Springs and lower Yellowstone falls. We stopped by Norris Geyser basin for a walking tour of the most thermo-active part of the park when we were treated to a display of Steamboat, the worlds largest active geyser popping off! It has been more active in recent years but unlike Old Faithful that is very predictable at least for a geyser, Steamboat can erupt between 4 days and 50 years. This day plenty of people were waiting for her to go, some had even wrapped their vehicles in blue tarps anticipating the eruption. We were a ways away when it went but I was able to get back and film it. Afterwards my truck, parked a half mile away was covered in white minerals from the eruption.

Prismatic Spring, Yellowstone NP, Wyoming

Yellowstone River Falls, Yellowstone NP, Wyoming

Norris Geyser Basin, Yellowstone NP, Wyoming

Steamboat Geyser, Yellowstone NP, Wyoming

This video was for our Grandson Dawson but really shows a lot of the Yellowstone beauty and also a video of Steamboat geyser blowing its top!

Boondocking in Targhee National Forest, Idaho

While at Yellowstone we boondocked two states away. Only ten miles outside of West Yellowstone, we were camping in the National Forest of Idaho. We had to cross a sliver of Montana to get to Wyoming and the main part of the park.

While camping in this dispersed camping area we meet some interesting people who also camped near us. One was a young man named Jay who after loosing his son at birth was taking a small heart shaped urn with his ashes with him to all the places he wanted to share with his son. It reminded me of the Martin Sheen movie about the Camino de Santiago (The Way). He was just the sweetest person and we all loved meeting him and hearing his story. He had a significant impact on us all. Thanks, Jay!

We also meet two young ladies who had just finished up an internship in the US and were traveling to some National Parks before heading back to England for their last year of college. After reading the bear aware warnings they were scared to setup their tent and were planning to just sleep in the car. We discussed what prompts bears to visit in the night, gave them some bear spray and let them setup their tent inside the U formation we had created with our three campers. The next morning, they had picked up and gone but left a thoughtful note thanking us for making them feel so welcome.

Don and Renee had a mishap with a window, and they had to replace it, on the day he planned to install it, he awoke to a small audience and a few people selling tickets to the show "What a pane" by Don Hoyt with chairs set up like a theatre show. We had a good laugh and the men got the job done.

In the dark sky of Idaho, we had to pleasure of viewing the NEOWISE comet. We couldn’t have picked a better place to view the comet if we had tried. We got some photographs of the comet with the mountains in the foreground. We also experimented with light painting the campers under the dark sky with the comet overhead. Light painting is when you take a small light and illuminate something in the foreground of a long exposure dark sky photograph. It is an interesting effect and if done correctly can deliver amazing results.

Comet NEOWISE over Caribou-Targhee NF, Idaho

Note from some young girls we took care of...

JoAnn, Renee & Vickie hiking in Caribou-Targhee NF, Idaho

Kayaking the West Fork, Idaho

While camping in the Targhee NF near Island Park, Idaho we got the chance to kayak some really nice water. The Henry Fork where we put in was popular with both boaters and trout fishermen. Fishermen used drift boats which are bowed bottom boats with a sharp bow and stern and a center seat where an oarsman sits with two large oars. The fishermen fish from either end of the boat and we saw them dragging the trout in! We enjoyed the swift current where you only had to paddle to choose your line in the river. We drifted by steep basalt canyon walls where the river had cut through the rock over time.

Don & Renee kayaking the Henry's Fork, Island Park, Idaho

Paul and Vickie kayaking on Henry's Fork, Island Park, Idaho

Kayaking Henry's Fork, Island Park, Idaho

Here is another video from this day. We didn't mean to scare the birds. But it was beautiful site to watch!

The water was moving quickly and this was a really fun kayak trip!

Sun Valley

Leaving the West Yellowstone are we headed northwest to the Sun Valley area and Ketchum. We found a boondocking site north of town with a three-day limit which gave us enough time in Ketchum to get a feel for the city. This is an old mining town that developers worked to make into a resort town, with some success. Downtown reminded me of Jackson Hole with the high-priced stores and fancy restaurants built with a western theme.

One of the surprises for us was to learn that Ernest Hemingway lived his final years here and is buried at the local graveyard. He was suffering from depression caused by what now is thought to have been bi-polar. He had health issues caused by injuries he had acuminated over the many years of hard living and after treatment for his mental conditions left him unable to write, he took his own life. His grave is commonly filled with tributes left to him, either money or alcohol. When we visited there were several bottles of alcohol, half drank left on his flat grave marker. He had moved to Ketchum to get away from the limelight, relax and enjoy some trout fishing. Such a tragedy to lose someone to mental illness. While there I did read one of his famous writings, ‘The Old Man and the Sea’.