Mud Lake ID

A couple of days ago I found a log headboard on a local online classifieds site.

I have often seen these kinds of headboards, have always liked them, have never been able to afford them, and when I unexpectedly came across this one for $25 I jumped all over it.

LC, Kory and I made a quick stop to do errands this morning in Blackfoot, and then drove to a tiny community whose name I have already forgotten that was located just beyond Idaho Falls.

Straight up farm country, with terrain filled with gravel roads, endless BLM land, and endless open fields that were already in the beginning stages of growth even this early in April.

A whole lot of sage and irrigation equipment and silos and tractors and mobile homes backed up to growing crops.

After quickly ending our business and loading our headboard (that also unexpectedly came with log side rails and was nicer and heavier than I had expected) we picked up the two lane Hwy 33 and headed towards a place that I have wanted to see ever since we arrived in Idaho.

Mud Lake:

http://fishandgame.idaho.gov/ifwis/ibt/site.aspx?id=98

Not long after we arrived in Idaho I sat in the living room in one of the old chairs that had been left behind by the previous home owners (before we became the proud owners of furniture that normal people our age usually already own - things like couches and love seats), and Googled the area that we had just moved to.

I spent an hour or more scrolling in all directions around our area - looking for hills, buttes, mountains, water, back roads, rivers, anything else that caught my attention as I tried to more fully understand the area that we had just moved to.

Mud Lake was one of those places.

It had water.  A big lake.  A smaller lake.  A river. A bird habitat. 

Many months later (after having driven the long way to get the headboard) we drove the long way home, just so that we could make a stop at this elusive Mud Lake place.

Even this early in the year, Mud Lake was beautiful.

More beautiful than I had ever expected.  Certainly more expansive than I had ever expected.

The lake was huge, there were trails veering off in many directions, there were inlets that I am certain must be full of water by spring time but at this time of year were still bone dry.

Even on a cool and cloudy day - with bands of rain all around us that threatened but never happened - and with endless leafless trees, I was very very pleased that we had taken the long way home................

Bypassing a few parking areas as we both tried to get the lay of the land, LC eventually pulled into a large picnic area close to what would usually be the water, but was now just a dusty dry river bed.

My dog lunged for the truck door, eager to be set free from the vehicle-bondage she had been quietly enduring for the past few hours.

I was eager to set her free.

We were in the truck instead of the Tahoe because we needed the space in back for the head board.  Which is fine, but Kory has learned over the past few weeks that she doesn't HAVE to sit quietly on the middle seat.  

She has learned that if she stands on my lap she can stick her head out of the window.

Which means that I spend a whole lot of time in the truck pinned to the back of the seat by a 56 pound dog.

And I'm always very thankful when she tires of that game, scoots back to the middle seat, curls up in a ball and goes to sleep.

We had driven past the lake, pulled in by the dry river bed, and as soon as I climbed out of the truck looked over at a still smouldering camp fire.

Picnic tables, restrooms, a small walk way that extended out into what would eventually be the river, views of the lake through the leaf-less trees, and on the opposite side of the road was the ever present endless acres of farm land................

The lake a few hundreds yards to our left.................

Enormous cotton wood trees along the shore of the river.

Cotton wood is a hard wood, and burns for a long time in a wood stove.

Pine is a softer wood that burns much faster.

Back east (at least in the south east) NOBODY burns pine if they have a choice, because pine burns so dirty and so quickly.

Here people PREFER pine, and don't like to burn cotton wood because they think it smells funny.

Much of the wood we cut recently is cotton wood and we're pleased to have it.

THESE cotton wood trees will be beautiful in another couple of months.............

So.............I don't often take pictures of animal droppings, but these were so big that they caught me off guard.

Elk, we think................

After loading back into the truck we headed slowly back the way we had come, now in search of a place to pull off so that we could walk down to the lake...............

 

We had Kory on leash and as we stood in this elevated place looking down over the lake, and I had a good look at it for the first time, I realized just how big of a body of water it was.

We lived in the desert.  We had been happy to find little Springfield Lake not long ago, and were even happier to find public accesses to the very huge American Falls.

All this time I had thought that Mud Lake might (might) just be some nice little lake where LC could do a little fishing.

I had not expected THIS at all.

And so I was pleased....................

LC and Kory headed down the hill and began to walk in the sand, while I continued to stand beside the truck looking out over the unexpected place.

Lifting my camera I snapped a bunch of point-and-shoot pictures, before heading down to meet my man and my dog................

Looking down from the truck, LC and I had wondered if the land surface was nothing but shoe-sucking, leg-sucking, quick sand.

The kind that finds you sinking up to your thighs before you even realize it is happening.

The kind we ran into a couple of times while walking beaches in Juneau, Alaska.

But this place was nothing like that place.

A week ago we were walking in snow.

A week later we were walking here.

A sandy beach.  Shells buried in the sand.  A huge lake.  Waves.  A tide.

A tide?  Here in land locked Idaho??

And yet as we walked along the beach LC and I watched as the tide was definitely and unceasingly moving further and further inland....................

No surprisingly since she is from Florida, Kory loves the water.............

As we were walking in the sand I looked down and saw this print.

There were many prints and at first I thought they were Kory's.

LC pointed out Kory's print.  She has big feet but these prints were sharper and bigger.

Had to be a wolf.

In addition to this being a bird habit, it is also a very popular hunting and fishing destination................

Not long after I met LC, he and I went kayaking together out on Wood Reservoir, not far from the house.

We were still in the middle of that getting-to-know-each-other I-think-I-really-like-this-person stage, and we had pulled into one of the many inlets that were hidden throughout the extensive shoreline.

The water was shallow enough that I could see the bottom, and at one point I impulsively reached my arm down into the water trying to grab one of the multiple tiny shells that lay on the lake floor.

Eventually one of us grabbed an empty plastic soda bottle, and for the next 30 minutes we both fished out as many tiny shells as we could, before we decided that we had had enough and that it was time to move on.

I still have those shells.

Even after all the crazy-making of the last few years.

I have those shells that we pulled out of the lake not long after LC and I met each other in Tennessee.

I have the shells that I collected on numerous beach walks while living in Alaska.

And now I have a whole collection of these from a lake in Idaho................

There was still much to see in Mud Lake.

We knew that we had barely touched the surface of what was at this place, but it was time to head home.

It had been a long day and we still had 60 miles to go.

Instead of walking back along the beach, LC, Kory and I climbed up the high embankment and walked the road back to the truck, so that I could take pictures of both the mountains, the water and the farm land.

Mud Lake is an AWESOME place.

We'll camp here soon, even if we have to sleep in the back of the Tahoe.

Which (the way things are going in the cheap camper-search department) may be what we have to do.

For me to kayak, and he to fish, and us to explore all of this area, it would be worth it.

I loved this place...................

They blend so well with the terrain that they are difficult to see.

Click on the picture and it will enlarge.

And you will the large flock of heron walking together in the field...........

A few pictures snapped on the move and on the way home.

I only took a few pictures.

It's hard to take pictures when there's a large dog standing on your lap with her head stuck out the window...........

The lake and mountains have become my landscape, my real world.................Georges Simenon

The lake and the mountains have become my landscape, my real world.

Georges Simenon

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/g/georgessim338938.html#j9Q7Yp2ccxpqHAcI.99

The lake and the mountains have become my landscape, my real world.

Georges Simenon

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/g/georgessim338938.html#j9Q7Yp2ccxpqHAcI.99

In Search Of A Camper - Moore Part 2

After leaving the Mountain Man Trading Post that was located on the outskirts of small town Arco, LC and I turned back onto Hwy 93 and headed towards the even smaller community of Moore, population 196.

There's not much in Moore.  

A few homes, a gas station that contains a large section of hardware supplies in back.  A this-and-that store that never seems to be open.

A few other store fronts that have been empty at least since our first trip to this area back in March of 2013.

Moore is not much more than a drive-by town.  

Most passers-by are either headed to Arco (or Blackfoot or Idaho Falls in one direction) or Mackay (or Challis and Salmon in the other direction). 

There is nothing in Moore to make it an actual "destination".

Aside from the mountains.

If Arco is at the base of the Big Lost River Valley, then Moore is the place where the mountains are born.

Only 40 miles from Atomic City, it may as well be a world away.

We saw the camper as soon as we pulled off the highway.

Parked in the empty parking lot of an empty building, both LC and I looked at each other and smiled.

From a distance it looked to be exactly what we wanted.

From a distance.................

A moment after we pulled into the parking lot a man about my age, riding a four wheeler, came pulling into the lot.

We all shook hands and LC and I am began to circle the outside of the camper.

And the man began to talk and talk. And talk.

Professional performer.  One man band.  Bought the camper for $400 cash and $150 worth of 22 ammo from a guy at a bar down the road.

Ignore the asking price on the sign.  Just want what I've got into it....................

I looked for a few minutes and left the camper-owner and LC talking and looking, while I went in search of a restroom.

On the way back to the camper I veered across the road, walked between two empty buildings, and stood looking out over the mountains.

God they were beautiful. 

  Stunningly, wonderfully beautiful.............

I had seen the painting on the side of an empty building many times as we drove by it.

Now, standing still, I looked up at it and studied it, and then wondered what the story behind it was.

It seemed so random.  So out of place in the middle of isolated, rural farm country and surrounded by steep snow capped mountains.

There had to be a story behind it.

I only hoped that the story was a simple public service reminder, and not the personal appeal of a family who had been devastated by drugs.

I hoped...................

I loved this little building..

Empty and I wish that I had the money to start a business there..............

We have told endless people that we didn't care what the inside of their campers looked like because we were going to gut it out and finish it the way we wanted anyway.

I don't want to cook inside a camper.  

I don't care about a bathroom - I would go in the woods happily all day long instead of carrying nasty-ass tanks around with me and then having to dump and clean.

I had been an adventure racer for heaven sakes.

LC had spent three years in Vietnam.

We could go in the woods.

Inside didn't matter.  The only criteria was that the exterior had to be solid.

Straightforward enough we thought.

Only apparently it isn't.

As with other campers - broken windows, severe water damage, crumbling internal structure, water logged roofs, dry rotted tires, doors so out of alignment that they won't shut all the way, metal siding pulling away from the sides.

Etc etc and etc.

As LC and I had walked around it and inside it, the used-car-salesman-one-man-band had kept talking a non-stop blue streak, pointing out the obvious things that were wrong with it and then telling two people who knew better, how these "minor problems" were all quick and easy fixes.

When I arrived back at the camper the guy was still talking a blue streak.

A wheeler dealer indeed.

Eventually we said that we would talk it over together and come to his house to let him know of our decision.

LC and I talked for a few minutes.  We had already decided.

Disappointed at one more dead end we made a quick stop at used-car-salesman's house, and then headed back towards Arco and then home.

The search continues..................

An unexpected and unknown (but architecturally pleasing) structure in a back yard in Moore Idaho............

By the time we were 10 miles from the house, the sunny skies of the morning had changed to overcast.

It was the silent warning of things to come, because within 24 hours of this trip, our area was again covered in snow.

The Twin Buttes.................

Aside from the hallway, this is my dogs' favorite place to hang out.

She sleeps in the dirt in the green house.  Watches the deer and birds through the windows of the greenhouse.  Digs mighty holes in the dirt that is in the planter boxes.

And will be broken hearted when we begin to tear all of this out.

We LOVE this green house but it is so badly constructed that we really have no choice.

It is not obvious in these pictures but the green house:

1.  Has support beams that have been extended by adding shorter beams to the bottom of the longer beams (with a piece of lumber nailed to the two, to hold them together).  And THEN they have been extended even higher by setting them up onto cinders blocks.

2.  The roof line of the green house is higher than the gutter system of the house.

3.  There are huge gaps in the frame in many places where the green house attaches to the house.  Which lets in cold air, rain and snow.

4.  Planter boxes were built with a patchwork combination of lumber, plywood, press board, cheap chipboard (and the lesser grades are warped and beginning to crumble).

Good idea.

Bad implementation.

The plan?  Tear down the green house where it stands.  Build an outdoor patio in this space and about the same size.  Build a smaller green house outside the firewood storage area - one side green house and one side lumber storage.

But our dog LOVES this place and she will be broken hearted when it's gone................

In Search Of A Camper- Arco Part 1

 
A view on the way to Arco....................

Arco is a small farming town that is located at the base of the Lost River Valley.
Arco is where my Mountain Boy and I started our search for a home to buy.
We found the town purely by accident, after spending endless days and nights and weeks and months searching on line.
Trying to figure out where we are supposed to be.
Trying to find a quiet and pretty place where we could live quietly and prettily.
Trying to find something that we could afford.  That wasn't close to neighbors.  That was close to mountains and water.
It was a tall order.  
Too tall in fact, and at the end of the day we ended up compromising after first realizing that we couldn't afford it all, and then making decisions about what on the list was truly the most important to us.
Since moving to Atomic City late last summer we have begun to find our way around just a little.
Begun to find water.  Begun to explore the mountains in the Big and Little Lost River Valleys and begun to explore the buttes closer to town.
A lot of people don't seem to think much of Arco.  
As with so many small farming towns spread out in fly over country, the young people are fleeing at the first opportunity.
As with so many towns in every state in the nation, it is struggling to survive.  Struggling to stay relevant, struggling to find reasons for people to stay, struggling to pay the bills.
We like Arco very much.  The mountains begin there.  The stores are small businesses and the people are quiet and decent.
If we had held out longer we may have found a house in Arco that met our needs, but we saw so many that were in such bad shape and when we found this home in Atomic City it held so many possibilities.
A crazy amount of house for such crazy little money, and only 30 minutes from Arco.
We have met Arco people in our travels who lived in Atomic City for a time.  
Generally the men loved it out there and talked about the great hunting, and the women hated it and talked about the lack of people and shopping.
Thankfully I'm not much of a people person.  
Or a shopper.
A few days ago - before the snow and the temperatures that have again bottomed out - we drove to Arco on a warm and very sunny day.
We were on the hunt for a camper.
That hunt is turning into a bigger deal than either of us ever imagined.  As is usual, there is not a lot of money to devote to such things and even though there are cheap campers out there, the ones we have seen so far have been..........total crap.
Apparently people in this region have no idea how to care for campers.  Lots and lots (and lots) of water damage.
On this particular day we did not have any leads but wanted to go for a drive anyway on such a beautiful day.  Knowing that the owner of the Mountain Man Trading Post knew everybody in town we pulled into the parking lot.
LC and I have visited the Mountain Man a number of times (both during house hunting trips and since we moved to Idaho).  The food is always good.  The owners are always welcoming and smiling and full of good conversation, and frequently we see the same faces sitting at the tables laughing and informally helping themselves to the ever-present coffee pot.
It was late morning by the time we pulled in, and as LC and I climbed out of the Tahoe I looked around me and instantly decided that I would stay outside while LC visited.
He wandered inside and I reached into the back seat of the truck to encourage Kory out of the vehicle.
She eagerly jumped down to the ground and I let her lead the way.
The huge, weathered and iconic Mountain Man figure that towers over the dirt parking lot............

The Mountain Man is not the only icon that is specific to this small, farming town.
Looking back towards town I smiled when I again saw Number Hill.
The graduating classes from the high school have been recording their graduating year on this hill for almost the past century.
I haven't looked very closely, but have seen dates going all the way back to 1922, and locals have told me that there is usually rappelling gear and alcohol involved.
I have no idea whose bright idea it was originally, but I love this part of the history of Arco.
Arco is also the first town in the world that was lit with atomic power (it only lasted for 15 seconds or so, but still..........the first).
Between its venerable place in atomic history, Number Hill, the bright green burger restaurant called Pickles Place (that serves huge Atomic Burgers), it probably being the only desert town in the nation that is home to a submarine tower, and its proximity to the Big Lost River Valley, Arco is just a way cool town...........

Some pictures of the sub taken during one of our house hunting trips a year ago:
http://livingthejuneauadventure.blogspot.com/2013/03/big-lost-river-valley-idaho-part-3.html

Kory and I wandered in back of the trading post, both of us enjoying the company of each other and the beautiful day.
Looking south I could see Big Butte, towering over the landscape as it always does.
I like the sight of it.
The lone and silent mountain in the desert dominates the landscape, and after hiking it with LC last November I cannot look at it without remembering just how deceptively beautiful and mystical of a place it is.
I stood for a moment looking out at it fondly before allowing Kory to pull me in the direction she insistently wanted to go.
OK Baby Girl........I'm coming.............


How had I never noticed this before?
And what the heck WAS it?
This seemingly random stone column was located at the edge of the parking lot and I studied it for a moment and to no avail, trying to figure out what it could possibly be............




As we wandered back to the front of the building I debated briefly whether or not I should go inside.
No.
I wanted to be outside and was in no mood to be around people.  I didn't have it in me to make small talk, to be polite, to smile and be friendly, do all the things I was supposed to do when in the company of friendly acquaintances.  I was content to wander in the sun.............

The thing about wandering around on foot is that you see things.
Things that often get overlooked when you are in a hurry.
Things like whimsical and colorful animals made by someone who sees the creative in the functional...........



This abandoned little wooden structure always speaks to me.
It stands alone in a field close to the highway, and is beautiful against the backdrop of snow covered mountains................




A look further down the highway.
Craters of the Moon is located 18 miles from Arco in this direction............

 


My wayward dog has run away from us twice in the past week.
The first time, Kory and I were walking on trail close to town in Atomic City.
My athletic and sweet girl was running off leash when suddenly she stopped and focused intently on a clump of tall sage bushes on the opposite side of the fence.
I stopped walking and looked in the direction of her focus, wondering what she had keyed into.
There was nothing.
But there was something - because my pup was un-moving and totally focused.
In one split second I saw the ears pop up, my dog jumped the fence, and the race was on.
The deer was sprinting at full speed through the field.
My dog was sprinting at full speed right behind the deer.
I called her.  KORY!  Nothing.
KORY!!
She didn't even slow down.  Not for one second.
Within 15 seconds both deer and dog had crossed the distance of the field.
The deer jumped the fence and began to run down the center of the road, with Kory right behind her.
Within another 10 seconds they had both disappeared from sight.
Damn!
It took both LC and me another 15 minutes to find her, and by the time we did she was skulking her way back to the house..................

The next day I was again walking with Kory out on BLM land.
As with the previous day, everything went fine until the moment it didn't.
With me walking and her running and happily chasing birds, we had spent an hour traveling together in the sunshine of desolate and empty BLM land, contentedly wandering from one field to the next, one trail to the next.
Close to the silos I made the fateful decision to wander off trail, cross over a field, walk the fence line, and then hit the field where the hay bales were located.
One of the huge 3-trailer-long hay trucks drove by and when Kory saw it she began to run at full speed.
"She'll turn back" I thought.  Because that's what she does.  Only this time she didn't.
KORY!!  Nothing.
A repeat of the day before.
Within 10 seconds Kory had already covered the distance of the field, jumped the fence and (still sprinting at full speed) hit the road and sprinted in the direction the truck was traveling.
Once the truck was long gone she stopped running and turned back.
I called her name, this dog looked in my direction, and then disappeared from sight in front of the silos.
Damn!
I was still in the middle of the field and (as I continued to walk in that direction) made a phone call to LC for the second time in two days.
I watched his truck stop at the road intersection, and then watched as the truck disappeared in front of the silos.
By the time I got to the road our wayward dog was in the truck.
This was getting old fast, and both LC and I were angry at Kory and she knew it.
She wasn't used to either of us talking to her sternly but maybe it got through to her.
She wants to please so much, but every once in a while Kory gets into a single minded desire to run and will not listen.
Somehow we have to get her over that.............

More pictures of the area surrounding Arco and the Mountain Man Trading Post............




When I turned around I was looking at my smiling Mountain Boy.
I could tell that he was pleased.
Either he had a nice conversation with some good people, or he had a line on a cheap camper, or both.
It was both.
Someone knew of a camper for sale in Moore, but did not know much about it.
OK.......on a beautiful, sunny, warm day, we would take a drive and see if we could find a camper.............

Heading back through town..............

Humans are aware of very little, it seems to me, the artificial brainy side of life, the worries and bills and the mechanisms of jobs, the doltish psychologies we've placed over our lives like a stencil. A dog keeps his life simple and unadorned.............Brad Watson, Last Days Of The Dog-Men