I will tell you that the road to Idaho was a long one. I liked the idea of taking a bus from Utah, it picked me up from my hotel and drop me at the airport where I could meet Travis. But this regional transit bus took FOREVER, like 10 hours forever. There were multiple connections, and an unnecessary hour delay waiting for a connecting bus that never came. Utah plains are dry and scrubby and all look the same so I was not inspired to take any photos, sorry.
I finally arrived in Boise around 7pm, only to discover that the motel that Travis booked would not let me check in, even though I had the confirmation number!!! What a day I tell you. They let me in around 9 when they caught him on the phone, and when he arrived around midnight we finally went to sleep.
Morning in Boise! Everything turned around from here. It's the capital of Idaho, a speck of blue in a sea of red, and the largest city between Portland and Salt Lake City. And really cute!
We met our Warm Showers host, Jen, who made us feel at home immediately.
She has a Rhodesian Ridgeback names Rooster, who is enormous and was bred to hunt lions in South Africa. Ridgebacks were crossed with wild dogs and still retain this little Mohawk down their spines. They are supposed to be able to run forever and go 24 hours without water. Wellllll Rooster is big and intimidating but he doesn't handle the heat well, and he has to be tucked in a blanket at night or else he'll whine and Jen will have to get up and re-cover him. Rooster!
Travis still had grad school work to do somehow so we set up at Big City Coffee and started errands.
I picked up my bike from the shop we shipped it to, and then I got groceries and camping fuel. Travis finished his paper, we checked out the Capitol and headed back to Jen's.
We were Jen's first Warm Shower's guests, and she gave us the royal treatment. I don't want to raise expectations too high for any future guests, but damn. Her house is really beautiful, like the shower in our room had two shower heads! Two!! She invited her buddy Will over and we grilled out, drank beer from her kegerator and hung out till the sun went down. Which is like 10pm up here.
We arose early, packed up all our stuff in the backyard, got an enormous breakfast and left Boise for our first day of tour.
Fyi I am writing on my iPhone now, so I feel like I'm writing the longest text ever. Posts might be shorter and less elaborate.