Beers of the Northern Rockies and the Northwest

By Paul | Jul 19, 2012
Posted in: Bars, Booze, Beer, Etc., Idaho, Montana, Washington, Wyoming |

Read the stats and we’re a Budweiser nation. Travel around, and it seems like nobody drinks the stuff. Milwaukee and the rest of Wisconsin is a Miller strong-hold that spreads into the surrounding area. Same with Yuengling and the Pennsylvania area and Coors and Colorado. Meanwhile, Upstate New York loves its Labatt Blue. The only place that seems to support Bud is St. Louis – no surprise there. So what gets [...]

Visiting Lake Pend Oreille and My Dad’s College Buddy, Jeff

By Lisa | Jul 11, 2012
Posted in: Idaho |

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While passing through northern Idaho, we stopped to visit one of my Dad’s college buddies, Jeff, and his wife, Mary, for an action-packed 24 hours. Jeff and Mary have a place on Lake Pend Oreille (means earring, loosely), a large lake north of the more touristy Lake Coeur d’Alene. It’s a beautiful lake; National Forests surround much of the lake and sheer cliffs make long sections uninhabitable. It still feels wild, [...]

One of the many tragic scenes in Romeo and Juliet.

How Boise became one of my favorite towns

By Lisa | Jul 6, 2012
Posted in: Idaho |

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It didn’t happen all at once. When we first visited Boise, it was January and the city seemed to be asleep. I enjoyed the Basque restaurants, hiking in the foothills with friends, and The Modern Hotel and Bar…but I wasn’t yet in love with the city. When we returned in June, the city was awake and alive, in the full throes of summer. That’s when it happened. Here’s what helped [...]

Unimaginable Luxury at The Modern Hotel and Bar in Boise

By Lisa | Jul 5, 2012
Posted in: Bars, Booze, Beer, Etc., Hotels, Idaho |

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The Modern Hotel and Bar is the best hotel, and bar, in Boise. It may be the best hotel, and bar, in the entire state of Idaho. The Hotel After camping for six weeks straight, it’s hard to overemphasize how luxurious our room at The Modern felt. We’d been daydreaming about this room for at least a week before we arrived. We dreamed about the comfy bed, gigantic rain shower, [...]

Casey and Molly help restore our faith in humanity!

By Lisa | Jul 3, 2012
Posted in: Idaho, Reality |

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As much as we loved southern Idaho, certain things were starting to drag us down. There were too many crazy kids, too many people with no respect for boundaries, too many insane drivers. For the majority of our travels, our fellow travelers have been retirees, but now we were being bombarded by families with young kids. I’d always thought that we’d meet a bunch of people on our trip, new [...]

Ernest Hemingway's gravestone in Ketchum, ID.

Visiting Hemingway’s Grave in Ketchum, Idaho

By Paul | Jul 3, 2012
Posted in: Bars, Booze, Beer, Etc., Books, Idaho |

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Ernest Hemingway’s grave is in Ketchum, Idaho. The gravestone is spare and reserved. It’s off the main road, under a grove of trees, next to members of his family, and decorated with notes, coins, and the occasional bottle of booze. His gravestone reminded me of Mies Van Der Rohe’s gravestone in Chicago. The setting reminded me of Ernest Hemingway. Paris is the city I most associate with Ernest Hemingway. When there, we [...]

The Bonneville spring running into the cold stream.

The Idaho Drive: Ketchum to Boise via Stanley, Boise to McCall and back again.

By Lisa | Jul 2, 2012
Posted in: Drives, Idaho |

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We had some time to kill in the Boise area and we’d heard a lot about the surrounding mountains on our last visit, so we figured we’d get out and explore the area ourselves. Who knew Idaho could be so amazing? Here are some of the things we found (and loved), as we looped from Ketchum to Boise, by way of Stanley, and from Boise to McCall and back, by [...]

Who Named it Craters of the Moon National Monument?

By Lisa | Jun 28, 2012
Posted in: Idaho, Parks |

2 Comments

When you visit Craters of the Moon National Monument, your first thought is that the person who named the place didn’t know too much about the moon. One wonders if he’d ever even looked at the moon. This is because the place he (most likely, it was a ‘he’) named Craters of the Moon is a giant, dark lava flow. It represents one of the more recent eruptions in this part [...]

The #1 Thing to do in Boise is not in Boise

By Lisa | Jan 23, 2012
Posted in: Idaho |

5 Comments

When you have an out-of-town visitor, what’s the number one thing you want to show them in your city/town? When I can manage to remember, I’m planning to ask random people this question and hopefully discover the people’s guide to the best things to do in a city. Last weekend, we were in Boise for a work/fun visit, and I had the opportunity to solicit opinions for what I thought [...]