Location: Ponderay, Idaho 

Trip Mileage: 8,337 

Car Mileage: 218,628 

I watched a lot of movies over the last two years of living alone. In 2023 I watched 282 of them. I consider myself a cinephile, even though I lack the technical knowledge to be a critic like Roger Ebert. Last year I began tagging the films that inspired me to quit my job and travel. A handful of these films simply held a meaningful quote such as “But what good is saved time if nobody uses it.” from Before Sunrise, but one movie that stood out was Into the Wild. 

Into the Wild, a true story, is a book-turned-movie that I first read in my 10^th grade English class inspired by the life of Chris McCandless. A college graduate, Chris is discontent and restless with the traditional path laid out before him. So he sells everything and sets out towards Alaska. His journey culminates with the accidental consumption of poison berries in the Alaskan wilderness. The film shows Chris in his dying moments etching “Happiness only real when shared”, his great epiphany, in the margin of a book. His pursuit of adventure and a meaningful life culminates in this suffocating and liberating moment of isolation. It’s a powerful scene, and those words have often scrolled through my head. 

I made my mom sit down and watch this movie with me a week before I left. I thought it was going to be a fun prank to ratchet up her level of concern, but I immediately felt bad for her as the opening scene is of Chris’ mother awaking from a nightmare and crying at the memory of her dead son. My mom asked me before I left whether I was trying to go off the grid the way Chris did. I assured her no and to please look for me if I go missing. 

Since I dropped off my friend Stephen at the Salt Lake City airport on April 29^th until arriving at my Uncle Chris’ house on May 10^th, I didn’t talk to anyone beyond giving my order to a cashier. There was a day in Boise, Idaho, where I watched friends playing Spikeball in the park, and I wished to be transported home to play with my buds. I sat on a lake shore surrounded by families and certainly missed the times I sat in the sand with mine in Hilton Head. However, I also savored the comforting serenity of solitude. 

My daily itinerary is pretty primal: food and a place to sleep. Everything else (ie, a power outlet or a bottle to pee in) is a luxury. I absolutely miss my friends and family, but not having an agenda filled with alarm clocks, lunch breaks, and game nights is actually an incredible breath of fresh air. I haven’t achieved the enlightenment of a hermit yet, but I have learned that the peaks and valleys of life become more level when the only personality to contend with is my own. Without a travel companion I don’t have anyone to laugh around a campfire with, but I also don’t have to worry about someone else’s sour mood ruining my day. The idea of “Happiness only real when shared” is TBD. 

So what did I do the past two weeks? I covered just about every relevant inch of Idaho.

I previously mentioned my hope to validate a fixation I have built towards Idaho over the past six months. Some places fell short of expectations, and some have already made me want to return. 

After publishing my last blog in the McDonalds parking lot in Pocatello, ID, I drove down to  City of Rocks. This was one of the places I was most looking forward to exploring, and it proved to be a pretty magical experience. I spent the night as the lone camper in a small oasis filled with dozens of owls; it was a scene straight from Privet Drive.

Moreover, the terrain was an ideal backyard for my inner kid: so many rocks to climb. I only got lost once and white knuckled my bear spray as I slipped into a creek while trying to get back to my car. I escaped with wet feet and unfortunately no bear encounters. Literally why the heck are bears not hunting me down? They really think I have the dexterity to aim and fire my bear spray before getting clawed? They’re dumber than I thought. 

Boise was next. From what I saw, I really liked it. While I can’t provide great commentary on the city life of Boise, I can tell you that they have great parks apart from their trees being tactically distanced so your Eno hammock can’t actually fit between them. They are just close enough that you can try to hang the hammock and make a fool of yourself when the hammock hook doesn’t reach the strap. You know how many times I have felt shame in the presence of people who are playing hacky sack? It is now one.  

After a few days in Boise, I trekked to the Sawtooth Mountains (allegedly better than the Tetons) and Craters of the Moon National Monument. As with each of my destinations, I avoid looking at photos so I can be surprised. In the case of the Sawtooth Mountains this was a good thing. They were properly named as the peaks look like a jagged edge. I won’t be able to compare them to the Tetons for a couple months.

I wish I had looked ahead to temper my expectations for Craters of the Moon. It wasn’t bad, but I expected to see some crater from a piece of moon rock or maybe moon-like terrain. Instead, it was miles and miles of lava rock and old volcanoes. Volcanoes are objectively rad, but I was shooting for the moon! In retrospect, I’m not even sure how a meteor from the moon would be even possible. Oh well. Who knew Idaho had a bunch of volcanoes? 

The drive from the Sawtooths to Crater of the Moon was more eventful than it should have been. I was way too daring for a guy in a Civic trying to drive up a snow-covered road. Instead of getting a better view of the mountains, I collected thick packed snow underneath my car. I drove fast enough not to get stuck, but my check engine light flickered on.

After googling my car’s symptoms, my options were a fuel leak or minor issues. I drove another 30 minutes and noticed my gas gauge was lower than it should have been after just filling up. (For reference, a full tank is twenty dots and an empty tank is zero.) In ten miles, I lost two dots. I decided to call my sister as soon as I hit a patch of service to let her know about the potential problem.

I said “Bethany, I have been having some car trouble. If you don’t hear from me in two hours I might be stranded. Don’t tell mom so she doesn’t freak.” However, we both had spotty service at the time and she only caught a few unideal phrases. Bethany replied, “All I heard is you’re having car trouble and stranded.” I said, “NO NO NO” and the call failed. A couple minutes later my gauge gifted me a dot and the check engine light went away. I laughed at how horribly my heads-up warning had backfired. My sister definitely thought I was stranded.

I reached a patch of service thirty minutes later and was greeted by a barrage of texts from BOTH sisters asking if I was okay. Bethany had told Uncle Chris (and maybe the National Guard) to be on standby. I eased everyone’s concerns. The helicopters turned around. Lesson learned: Don’t drive over snow.  

After Craters of the Moon, I arrived at the Idaho Potato Museum. They had information detailing everything you’ve never wondered about potatoes. I found the idea of “Potato VR” very comical. A marriage between a starch and technological innovation.

I had some fries from the Potato Museum and then drove an hour to the most western installation of Frostop. I will detail my Frostop thesis in a separate blog post now that I have visited 10/11 (I’ll visit the last one in Illinois in August probably). 

Filled with fries and rootbeer, I kept driving to Salmon, Idaho. Even though this was the birthplace of Sacajawea, it was not a well-known tourist stop. I wouldn’t have known to visit if not for a former coworker who was from there. Beyond an interesting history stop, Salmon also had hot springs which did not disappoint.

As I was leaving the hot springs, I realized I hadn’t eaten lunch and had only eaten a protein bar for breakfast. It was 6 pm, and I’d hiked four miles. My body fell apart all at once in an impressively coordinated manner. I got to my car and threw back some ibuprofen and chased with as much peanut butter as I could scrape from the jar. This proceeded to be the worst I have felt on this trip to date. I mistakenly followed this “meal” with a tray of nachos, knowing each pork loaded tortilla chip was exacerbating the issue, and then crawled into my bed (trunk of my car) and went to sleep while it was still light outside. Nevertheless, Salmon was idyllic, and I would definitely go out of my way to visit again. I’d just make sure to eat lunch. 

A pack of big horn sheep was the only wildlife of note between Salmon and Missoula, Montana. I stopped here for a day to shower at Planet Fitness and hike “the M”, a trail looking over the city of Missoula and Montana’s campus.

This is my first mention of a shower, but don’t worry because it was actually my third rinse over the past 12 days. (Maybe I’ve just unlocked why people weren’t engaging in conversation with me.) Missoula was great, and I will be back in July between visits to Glacier NP and Yellowstone, so I didn’t feel a need to cram activities into my time there. 

Missoula was also overshadowed by my next stop: Wallace, Idaho. This is a town of 800 people supported by the richest silver mining district on Earth. I showed up too late to get a tour of the mines, but I dipped into the railroad museum and received an incredibly in-depth history of the town from my tour guide Neil, who happened to be in full railroad conductor costume. Neil, a volunteer probably in his late 60s, held an encyclopedic knowledge of the town and painted a rich history of Wallace. I cannot imagine my father in a 1920s era train engineer outfit. But after two minutes, Neil wasn’t wearing a costume anymore. Neil WAS this train guy. I’d shudder at Neil in a pair of jeans.

Here are a couple interesting facts. I-90 is the longest interstate highway in the US, running from Seattle to Boston and right through Wallace. Wallace held the last stoplight on I-90 as the town fought the fed’s attempts to replace their downtown with a highway. The town won by designating every building in town as a National Historic Place, and the highway was built beside the town instead of through. The second fact was that Wallace had an operating brothel until 1988 when the FBI shut it down. I asked Neil if he knew whether any of the prostitutes from 1988 were still in town (asking for a friend of course). He smirked and admitted there was one woman he was pretty sure worked there, but that most folks don’t want to talk about that. 

Wallace gets added on to my list of small towns worth visiting which now includes: 

Terlingua, TX 

Cloudcroft, NM 

Moab, UT 

Salmon, ID 

Wallace, ID 

The past few days have provided home cooked meals, a real bed, and a private shower with hot water. My hosts in Coeur d’Alene, ID, Chris and Karen, have been another oasis. My stay included a day trip over to the Grand Coulee Dam in Washington, one of the world largest concrete structures, as well as a tour of the one and only Buck knife factory.

The best part was being told each day before I departed on an adventure, “Dinner at 7”. In the words of my Uncle Rod, “The best food is free food.” This is of course followed closely by good food. I was fortunate to have both. To top it all off we were fortunate enough to have a clear view of the northern lights. (Which were apparently visible to most of the country)

The next two weeks I will have company in Banff and on the road to Alaska from my sister Bethany and my mom. For two weeks I won’t have to ponder whether happiness is only real when shared. McCandless fortunately had other quotes of note.  

“The freedom and simple beauty is too good to pass up.”

Chris McCandless