Son Clint and I recently finished the second of our two planned motocaching
trips of the summer. On this three day trip we picked up
geocaches in Idaho, Montana and Oregon. We left Clint’s place in
Lewiston shortly after 6:30 am Friday. It was cloudy and threatening
rain so I had my rain gear on when I left. We headed east up Highway
12 and stopped in Kamiah for gas. We had no rain up to that point
but it soon began. It wasn’t bad but enough to keep our speed in
check. I have traveled up the Lochsa so many times that there aren’t
any caches along that route that I haven’t already found so we
didn’t stop for a cache until Montana.
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Cache at very top |
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Near the top |
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Success |
Our
first endeavor was one called “Hippy Music Fest” a little west of
Lolo which has little to do with the cache other than the beginning
point was at a large open area with a stage near the highway. The
cache was only about 100 horizontal yards from where we parked but
maybe 200 feet or so in vertical distance. The first three pictures
will give you some idea. Not only was it very steep but the poor
footing was exacerbated by the rain. We eventuality made it to the
very top and looked quite a while before Clint found it. This cache
had been placed 10 years ago and had not been found in over two
years. It was easy to see why. Going back down was as bad as going
up.
We
continued to Lolo where we stopped for gas and ate lunch. I had
lined up quite a few caches along Highway 93 but we stopped for only
four and didn’t find two of those. One was supposed to be a 5
gallon container near the Lost Trail Pass Rest Area and I’m sure it
was gone or we would have found it. I’m pretty bad sometimes but
not that bad. And Clint certainly isn’t.
We
had reservations at the Super 8 in Salmon and it was very nice. We
hiked about ¾ mile down town to try to find some Mexican food. We
eventuality settled for a Mexican fast food place. Mine was fairly
good but certainly not what I would call Mexican. Just before we
started to hike back a downpour ensued. It finally let up somewhat
and we made our way back from awning to awning.
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Thermal Hot Springs |
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Sagebrush find |
We
had a nice breakfast at the Super 8 and proceeded south down Highway
93 to Challis. This is a fun ride along the Salmon River. A little
south of Challis we turned east on Highway 21 to Stanley. We
continued south on Hwy 21 picking up a few caches along the way. One
was at a thermal hot springs where there was a crowd of people. The
sun was shinning and it was warming up so I decided to take off my
rain pants. As I was leaning against my bike trying to get the pants
over my boots the bike rolled back a bit and down it went. It wasn’t
even on pavement so I told Clint it didn’t hurt anything to which
he answered, except your dignity. I told him I didn’t have any to
hurt.
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Not the Waldorf |
This
is a great motorcycle road with lots of tight curves. We passed
through Idaho City and began descending into the Boise valley. This
was the warmest part of our trip but it was only in the mid to upper
80’s. We took a route through Boise south of the interstate mostly
on Victory and Amity roads taking us to Nampa.
Our
stay in Nampa was at the Downtown Inn right downtown as the name
states. It was an old unkempt dumpy looking place but it wasn’t
all bad. It was clean, everything worked and the help was friendly
and accommodating. After settling in we rode over to visit son Milo.
His roommate was out for the weekend so we ordered pizza and had a
good visit.
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Rodentville |
We
had a decent breakfast the next morning at the motel and were on the
road by 7:30. We rode the interstate to the Fruitland exit and
proceeded north to Cambridge on Highway 95 picking up one cache along
the way. Then we took Highway 71 west which was new territory for
me. It was a nice motorcycle road with lots of turns and pleasant
somewhat open scenery. It looked like the beginning of chukar
country. At the summit we stopped for a cache in an old abandoned
cabin which was part of a cabin series. You could not see the floor
for all the animal droppings. The cache was supposed to have been in
a coffee can but all we found was the container and lid. I suspect
the rodents had gotten into it and made off with or eaten the contents.
We
began a long descent down to the river and across and eventuality to
Oxbow dam. Idaho Power has a campground there which was about as
nice as any I’ve seen. Clint had been there for some training when
he worked for Idaho Power. They had placed one of a series of twelve
caches there. It was an ammo box chained to a tree. We took a nice
break there at a picnic table in the shade.
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Clint has it |
Next
we resumed our ride on nothing short of a world class motorcycle
road. There were so many twists, turns and ups and downs that you
literally had a workout by the time you got to Joseph, OR. All this
was on a narrow but smooth road in thick forest. I was surprised
than I hadn’t heard about this road from some of my friends in our
riders group.
We
picked up a couple more caches a few miles from Joseph and then one
at a Fish and Game office in town. It was in a long cylindrical
container representing fish eggs placed in a box full of rocks like
where salmon would lay their eggs. It had received over 30
Favorite points from previous geocachers.
I’ll
only briefly mention my leaving Enterprise in the wrong direction
heading to a cache in Lostine that we hadn’t found on our previous
OR trip. After noticing that Clint wasn’t following I turned
around and went back. Like I said, I have no dignity so I just took
it in stride.
The
rest of our trip was familiar territory north and down Buford Grade
and up Rattlesnake Grade. We got to Clarkston before 3:00 pm having
traveled over 900 miles. We did more motoring and less geocaching on
this trip finding only 16 with 5 more that we didn’t find. It was
a great trip and the rain failed to dampen our spirits. M/W