Mrs Barker!!

Well, we are happy to say that we were able to see our friend Mrs Barker, in Ketchum! Mrs Barker was Gavin's second grade teacher last year. When we told her about our trip to Idaho she told us that her son lives here. She felt that we would be able to see each other over the summer! I have to admit that I was skeptical, but open minded. As the time has marched on it did not seem likely, but then she called with an invitation! Come to Ketchum and see the largest non-motorized parade in the NorthWest! And we were able to say yes. So, we drove over with the camper and met Mike, Lisa, and George. They had other friends and family visiting the area as well. Somehow it was a chance to see Ketchum, make new friends and relax without feeling like we were in the way or a nuisance! 
The kids loved playing with George, who is just 9 months old, and also playing and walking Atwood, the yellow lab.
The parade was amazing and town was very bike and walking friendly, which we did a lot of!
Here are the pictures!

front row seats!

hmm .... not sure what to say about this one!

this is a tribute to the Native Americans, a group of young bareback riders

no parade is complete without a camel in a top hat!

Mrs J, we found your baby bison! Gavin petted him after the parade.

the grand finale: a 20 mule team pulling 6 Ore Wagons! It was a bit of work to get them around the corner!

Then the ride home thru the Sawtooth National Forest ::

Redfish Lake

thank you very much to Mrs Barker & family for a terrific weekend!

pictures of the mule deer and kit (young fox)

Well, yes I think it is a fantastic idea to have the kids write a post! And I will, but at the moment I am doing laundry, and this is where many of the posts are done, because I can hop onto free wi-fi here. So, this is not a Gavin or Alexa post, and really won't be much of a post at all! But I am pretty excited about some of the wildlife I have been able to capture on the camera this week!
So, on one walk in the evening I saw mule deer on each end of the bike path, a single doe each, then toward the middle there was a doe with 3 fawns! And we have been seeing a kit on a falling down shed near the skate park!
We are gearing up to start some official school work, and I got the Gavin smirk and eye roll when I told him there would be lots of rules and probably a fire drill, ha! thanks for the ideas Mrs J!

I have a pretty good zoom but the deer don't pay you much attention.

 I was only 20 feet or so from this one, and the expressions while chewing cracked me up!

Ok, back in Boise!!
And our favorite water park! Roaring Springs! The temperature was cooler today (barely 80) so the park was not as busy! yeah!

The kids had a ball, and yes, I admit it is fun to watch them have that much fun! Lots of smiles today!

And we stopped at Barnes & Noble, to rest my weary mind and get us set up with some curriculum for the 3rd grader and workbooks to supplement Alexa! We are outfitted with a cursive writing workbook for Gav & workbooks for writing in general for both, as that is what they like least!
So, I feel like we are ready! The schools here will start on monday, so we plan to do the same.

The travel company is looking around the San Francisco area for the next 13 week assignment for us!

Slowing down a bit!

So, we are slowing down a little bit, bike riding and going to the library almost daily. We have stopped in at the skate park, which is conveniently located right along the bike path! We rode by quite a bit before we decided to stop. My heart can hardly stand to watch the kids - some so small! "dropping in" - literally! Gav does not have a skate board with him, or a scooter/razor he mostly watches, but if there are not too many folks he rides his bike in there, cautiously!!
I have been playing with the camera, so here are some pictures from the last couple of days!

sunset at the Lake

I cannot say how happy I am that they are still smiling, most of the time!!

Personal Water Craft on Payette Lake!

ok, yes, that is a ski-doo, or jet ski to all of us! But they say we rented a PWC, and even now have the "license" that is life long for the 7 minute training to rent them again in Idaho.

And they were enough fun, that I would do that again! Even in the cold rain, and that's what we did!
I only have a couple of pictures, because it started to rain, right away, and you know, being on the water is not conducive to taking pictures, especially when you are driving!

So, this was Alexa's choice for an activity, along with some rock climbing, but the rain has put that on hold. Maybe today, but we have already had another rain shower while we are here in the library today.

They need the rain here, so I am not wishing it away, yet.

But, back to Alexa's day: we rented the jet skis for 2 hours, and it was a cold, driving rain, so we returned them 20 minutes early. But we were moving right along for a lot of the time, they can go up to 40 mph, I was reading 53km/hr; not sure what the conversion was, but that was the top end of my comfort zone. The kids took turns with Cliff or me. Cliff was preferred, of course as he allowed them to drive, which Alexa really enjoyed! Gav gave it a go, but chose to ride instead. Also, Cliff's comfort level was FAST, so they both enjoyed that. Turns out they are both speed demons at heart, who knew?

So, the pictures.... and we had a rainbow to end the day, and some cloud pictures from this morning too! Oh, and to show just how close we are to the airport and what we see a lot of; there are some pictures of the Erikson Air Crane that is living at our end of the airport, you can see our window in the frame, to give you a sense of distance :)

4 x 4 on Brundage Mountain!

Another new experience! This one was loud and fast and pretty great! We decided that each of the kids would get a day when Cliff is off to chose the activities and dinner for the day. Yesterday was Gavin's day: we rented a 4 x4, we called it a dune buggy, I don't know what it is really called. They are street legal here! No mirrors, no signal lights, you just cannot drive them on the highway, otherwise, have fun. They gave us a map of trails all around Brundage Mountain. And we were off.

It was an 8 hour rental, and I was done after 6 of them! But it really was a cool way to see the mountain trails. We saw lots of signs of animals and wildlife, but they would have heard us coming from miles away, so we did not see any wildlife. We had lunch in an alpine meadow with a little stream running through it.

Here are the pictures!

the Lookout at the very top of Brundage

the lunch spot

Granite Lake

picking wild huckleberries, yum!

the dust! oh, the dust! But, that smile, that lasted all day!

No wifi, makes the posting harder!

Hello! I apologize for the extra long silence! The condo is so much better in every way; except no wifi!!
But I will try to be better about posting, at the library or the free spots in town!
We did not have much to show anyone for a week or so. We went back to Boise the last couple of days. We seem to talk ourselves into needing a trip, just to go somewhere, you know? So, this trip was, again, some resupplying and not paying top dollar, as well as a trip to Roaring Springs! A lovely water park, and it was the right type of day for it 100*, hot, hot, hot!

I have pictures! Probably more than you want to see ;)

Some more of the mountainous journey "through the canyon" as the locals call "highway" 55 along the Payette River too!

We are all doing well, better, as I said in the condo! For me especially, perhaps, as I have returned to sleeping at night! Yeah! The kids have the loft area with a king bed, which has a constant "wall of pillows" down the middle for proper bed sides throughout the night! Which seems to be working well! There is no A/C, which is fine by me! But it can be a bit stifling. They have the only ceiling fan in the loft, so we purchased a small fan for downstairs, which will work in the camper as well, when the time comes!

This is the hump week! Half way through! We are wondering where will be next, but have no idea, yet! Probably will not know until sept!

Ok, on to the pictures!

That would be Cliff in the lead, Alexa in second and Gav, who got a rough start in 3rd

the wave pool was a big hit, and very crowded. Cliff's ball cap can be seen between them!

I believe this is called Avalanche, it was terrifying, Alexa loved it, Gav & I just survived!

we all rode these, and enjoyed it.

Cliff also "rode" the Cliffhanger, where you step into a tube and drop 6 stories! He did survive, there are no pictures, unfortunately!

The kids have finished the summer reading program here, we will be finding things to do around McCall the next couple of weeks, as Cliff's schedule is not travel friendly through the end of August!

there are several wild fires burning in Idaho and Washington right now. This is one of the tools they use to fight them. It was refueling in a field alongside the highway on the way home. That open area in the middle is where the full bucket of water that they get out of whatever water source, lake? is available will ride.