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Sun Valley, Idaho
After driving about six hours, I arrived in Sun Valley, Idaho. It was a place I had never visited before and I was excited to check it out.Sun Valley, Idaho is not a town, in itself. It is a popular Ski Valley along the Wood River comprised of several small towns. The main towns are Bellevue, Hailey, and Ketchum.
Ketchum seemed to be the most popular. It was a bustling tourist community with traffic inching along through the quaint small town.
I was tired and not ready to deal with traffic, so found a National Forest road and drove to a place that looked like it would be nice to camp. Wrong! The mosquitoes had no mercy. They were biting any area of exposed skin several times in one chomp. I knew I had to get out of this place.
I went back into town and headed on down the highway until I came to a nice riverfront picnic area. I stopped for a while and enjoyed the peaceful sounds of nature. There were few others at the park. It was a good place to make lunch and chill.Knowing that I could park my van and camp any place in the National Forest, I wasn’t concerned about finding a place to sleep for the night.
When evening came, I decided to take a road going the opposite direction as last time and ended up in a beautiful green valley with pullouts along side the road. There were some interesting camper rigs pulled off to the side. I found my own little pull-out and nestled in for the evening. There was a very mild rain beginning to come down and the air so fresh and clean.
I grabbed my new instrument, a Strum Stick, which is a three string instrument similar to a guitar, but much smaller. I found myself playing a singing until I had a new tune going through my head. That tune would be the theme song for the next couple days.The next day I went back to the park to make my tea and chill. It was actually still quite cool out so I do mean “chill.” I crawled into my blankets with my hot tea and wrote in my journal, with the sounds of the river serenading me.
After a breakfast of Granola and banana, I drove to Hailey where I saw a Natural Grocers and grabbed a few items. I passed by the Starbucks (without stopping) and headed back to Ketchum to catch the Art Festival. After that I went to a hiking trail I saw earlier. I had my green drink of coconut water, Spirulina and Barley Grass, to both hydrate and give me extra energy for the hike.
It was a beautiful hike along the Wood River. I hiked about three miles in until I came to another parking lot and decided to turn around. There were lots of mountain bikers on this trail, and very few hikers. I could have taken side trails and continued on, but by the time I returned it was a six mile hike and the temperatures were nearing ninety degrees.After this beautiful hike and amazing day in the beautiful Sun Valley, it felt time to move on. I had no agenda. No destination. It was Saturday and I didn’t have to get in position for work until Sunday. I could stop anywhere I wanted. I loved this feeling.
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The Mount Baker Experience
As the weekend crowds poured into Birch Bay State Park, I drove up to the Mount Baker area to see if I could find a camp spot. I wasn’t worried because I could just pick up a permit at the Ranger’s station and park anywhere, but finding a camp spot where I can set up camp is much nicer. I drove into a campground a few miles out of the small mountain town of Glacier and found a great spot up on the higher level looking over the rest of the campground. I decided to stay a few days and set up my camp, including my Canopy, which is difficult for me to set up by myself.
That evening the camp host came along and told me that I had to be out of the spot tomorrow as it was reserved for the weekend. I was so bummed. I was all settled in for the weekend (It was a Thursday evening) and seriously bummed I had to not only move, but find out if I could even get another camp spot. The host said after she makes her rounds she would come back and tell me what would be opening up the next day. It took her quite a long time but she came back, as she said she would, and told me there were three sites that she knew of opening up and she gave me the numbers. She said that there was a nice one right on the river opening up but it was a first come, first serve site and she didn’t know when they were leaving.
The next morning, when I woke up, I made coffee and decided to take a walk to check out the three sites. The one on the river was already vacated at 8am, so I took my shawl out and threw it over the picnic table and put my coffee cup on it. I then ran back to my campsite and grabbed my camp chair and actual table cloth and took it to my new camp site.Life upgraded me to a beautiful space right on the rushing river. It was inconvenient to have to move, yes, but well worth it.
My journey up to Mount Baker was beautiful. I hiked the Chain Lakes trail to the summit and hit the snow so decided to go back down the way I came rather than try to navigate all the snow banks ahead. The views from the summit were incredible and it was just as beautiful hiking back down the Mountain as going up. It was a tough, up hill hike, but well worth the journey.
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Most Beautiful Place
I sit here, perched above the rushing river, at sunset, my feet soaking in a tub of hot water. I heated river water on my Coleman stove. I just hiked with my friend Doc up to 13,000 ft elevation where we met with the Continental Divide Trail. We took Doc’s 4wd miles up a pretty rugged road leading us up the side of the mountain, until it opened up into a heavenly expanse of mountains and meadows, filled with wild flowers, including the state flower, the Columbine.I was in complete awe of the beauty. We were in such a remote area. We climbed the trail taking us straight up the side of the mountain. There were beautiful fairy glens, where streams were coming down the mountains and wild flowers of deep, rich colors were growing in abundance.
We had to take it slow and take plenty of breaks because the altitude was so high. At the top we reached temperatures of 42 degrees. I was grateful I brought my heavy windbreaker as the wind was very strong.
After a beautiful day of hiking we came back to my amazing new camp right on the river. Across the river was a very tall waterfall falling from the mountains above. I still had cell service, my hotspot worked great and I could work from this beautiful spot in nature.In so many ways this is the experience I had been seeking; getting away from the commercial campgrounds and out in nature with no disturbances other than the Off Road Vehicle traffic that seemed to like the side gravel road running by my camp.
Being only a couple miles from town, I could easily drive to the coffee shop every morning, charge up my electronics and visit with the locals.It is nearing the end of June now and I must say time seems to have slowed down. It is hard to believe it has been only a month on the road. Sometimes it feels I’ve been out here so much longer. The first day of summer was last week and I still have the whole summer ahead of me.
A friend asked me about the concept of “time going slow” and asked “doesn’t this mean you aren’t having fun?” This is because it is said “time flies when you are having fun.” I asked him “wouldn’t you rather time slowed down when you were having fun so you can savor every moment?”Time is a gift right now and I am embracing the slow paced van life I am living. I don’t know when I will move on. Right now, I am loving where I am at and won’t “move on” until I feel the call. After all, isn’t this what my trip is all about? Following the call of spirit? I say YES!