July 9, 2023
We really do love most of our Harvest Host stays. We have met wonderful people and seen amazing things because of them and this week included two Harvest Host stays.
7/3- We arrived in Blackfoot, Idaho today at the Idaho Potato Museum. It is a Harvest Host stop that allowed us to camp in their parking lot. They did mention in their description that the museum was once a train depot built in 1912, so we were aware it was close to the railroad tracks. I guess the surprise for us was how many trains went by in the 24 hours we were there. It was a switching stop so not only did the trains go by once, but they went back and forth as they switched tracks, dropped off and picked up more train cars. https://idahopotatomuseum.com/home/plan-a-visit/
Despite having a pretty noisy night we did enjoy visiting the museum and learning about the history of potatoes especially in Idaho. Potatoes where first grown in Idaho by Mormon pioneers in the 1840’s. The altitude, water, climate and volcanic soil makes Idaho such a great place to grow potatoes. After exploring the museum we went to their café to order our baked potatoes which we enjoyed. We even had to try out some Chocolate Covered Potato Chips. They were the perfect combination of sweet and salty so I had a hard time sharing them with Frank.
7/4- We left one Harvest Host stay for another. We drove a short distance to Pocatello, Idaho where we stayed in the parking lot of The Museum of Clean. This was a nice quiet place to stay despite it being the Fourth of July and some people in the surrounding area where shooting off fireworks. The museum was closed for the holiday and we were the only vehicles in the parking lot. We didn’t do much today but go grocery shopping and hangout and relax in our RV. We were pleased to find our RV could boondock two nights in a row with our solar and still have energy left in the batteries.
The Museum of Clean was founded by Don Aslett who wrote 40 books on cleaning and taught seminars in the 1950’s. He was considered a cleaning expert at the time and in 2011 he opened his six story museum packed with cleaning items. https://museumofclean.com/
7/5- We got up this morning and as soon as the Museum of Clean opened at 10 am we headed in to tour it thinking there wouldn’t be much to see and it wouldn’t be very interesting. Boy where we wrong. The museum was packed with exhibits and most of them were interesting and some were just plain amusing. The first thing we spotted when we came in was Big Don. A giant statue who resembled the giant cowboy which was always put up for rodeo days in our hometown of Livermore, California when we were growing up. He and our hometown cowboy are Phillip 66 Cowboys that were displayed at Philip Gas stations in the 1950’s and 60’s. Now only 27 are known to still exist.
Don likes to make things out of cleaning items and we saw a variety of those from knights to dinosaurs to animals to even an orchestra of clean. Frank got into the act and created his own image of Mr. Clean.
One of the things I found interesting was an autoclave device. When I was growing up my mom worked at the Lawrence Laboratory in Livermore, California and part of her job was to autoclave glassware and instruments for the Scientists working there. I had often heard her talk about doing autoclaving but had never seen a machine and had no idea how they worked so it was interesting to learn more about them.
Apparently Don was quite the character and would travel to his various presentations with his toilet suitcase. He traveled millions of miles and would case quite the stir when his luggage rolled off onto the luggage carousel. An hour and a half after we started we were finally done browsing the museum and ready to hit the road
We didn’t have a very long drive down to Brigham City, Utah so once we checked into our campsite we decided to head up the road to Crystal Hot Springs in Honeyville, Utah. There we spent over an hour soaking and enjoying the hot springs. Crystal Hot Springs has multiple pools and has been around since 1937. Not only does it have a hot spring that produces water at 135 degrees, it also has a cold spring that produces water at 70 degrees. In one of the pools they had three waterfalls, one pure hot springs water, one cooled hot springs water and one cold springs water. https://www.crystalhotsprings.net/home/#
After our long soak we stopped on our way back to the RV for dinner at Burger n Scoops where we got fresh cherry milkshakes.
7/6- We had quite the busy day, our son who lives in Utah had made recommendations of things to see in the area so we headed out to see how many of them we could see. The first place we headed to was the Brigham City Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge. The bird refuge is positioned on the edge of two migration routes the Pacific and central US. It is a main stop for many birds on their long flight south and back. https://www.fws.gov/refuge/bear-river-migratory-bird/visit-us We drove the 12 mile dirt trail through the refuge where we saw a wide variety of birds and lots of baby birds.
On our way back we stopped at the visitor center and explored there. We found that the airboat which everyone associates with Florida was actually invented there in 1943 by Cecil S Williams and G Hortin Jensen. They were trying to figure out a way to get through the shallow waters and mud flats without the time-consuming poling or slogging by foot. They bought a small aircraft engine and attached it to a flat bottom boat. Their experiment was a success and now airboats are used throughout marshy areas.
Next we headed out to Promontory Summit where the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads met and a golden spike was driven to mark that occasion in 1869. We learned that originally both railroads built past each other for 200 miles before they were finally backtracked and were brought together. https://www.nps.gov/gosp/learn/historyculture/index.htm We found that four o’clock in the afternoon they would run one of the trains down the track and since we had an hour to kill we decided to head out to the Spiral Jetty.
We were warned by the Park Ranger that the dirt road to the Spiral Jetty was long and bumpy, but that is what Jeeps are for so off we went. The Spiral Jetty was an art creation by Robert Smithson in the 1970’s at the north end of the Great Salt Lake. https://www.diaart.org/visit/visit-our-locations-sites/robert-smithson-spiral-jetty He used six tons of black basalt rock to build the spiral. The spiral is 1,500 feet long and 15 feet wide counterclockwise coil. Due to the changing water levels of the Great Salt Lake sometimes it is visible and sometimes it’s not. It was worth the trip out to see it and the surrounding area and the spiral was completely visible as the water level of the Great Salt Lake was low.
We managed to get back to Promontory Summit just in time. There are two trains that met in 1869. The Central Pacific Jupiter, a wood fed engine, and Engine No. 119 which was a coal fed engine. The engine they ran while we were there was No. 119. We got to watch them shovel coal as they prepared for their short trip up and down the track. After watching the engine it was time to head back to the RV and get ready to meet up with our son, his wife and grandchildren for dinner.
We had been told that Maddox Ranch House was the place to eat and had been around since 1949. They are famous for their fresh rolls and raspberry honey butter so we made reservations for the seven of us there. https://maddoxfinefood.com/ Our son and family drove up to meet us and we headed off for an enjoyable dinner and visit. After dinner we all went back to our RV where his wife gave both Frank and I haircuts. She has cut our hair several times over the years that they have been married and we are happy to have her do it. It was fun spending time together and catching up. Time passed so quickly and they had to head home and we were sad to see them go as we probably won’t see them again until next summer.
7/7- Today we headed up Logan Canyon to see the spectacular views there and to visit Bear Lake. https://www.utah.com/things-to-do/scenic-drives/logan-canyon-scenic-drive/ Along the route we noticed many interesting rock formations. One of the most interesting things we found was Rick Spring that was bubbling up inside a cave. Apparently rock layers that surround the springs cracked on a fault line allowing the water to flow out. Over the years the limestone has dissolved and more water flows quickly creating a stream.
Seeing Bear Lake was not as exciting after viewing Rick Spring. The gray limestone rock that forms the canyon has allowed calcium to leak into the lake over the years and that calcium reflects light from the sky. Because part of the sky was overcast and part was sunny we could see the effect on the lake as half was grey and the other half bright blue.
Our son had told us that when we got to Bear Lake we had to try the famous Raspberry milkshakes they serve there so we stopped at Ephraim’s and enjoyed them with the locally carved bears. Then it was time to head back to our RV as we were supposed to meet Frank’s cousin for dinner. Unfortunately he had to work late so we rescheduled for breakfast tomorrow before leaving town.
7/8- Went to breakfast this morning at IHOP and had a wonderful visit with Frank’s cousin and his wife. Then we had to hurry back to the campground as check out time was 11 am. By the time we got ready to leave we were about 15 minutes late getting out and hitting the road. We had a long drive with lots of traffic to Rock Springs, Wyoming. They were doing roadwork along the way and that really slowed us down. We got into the Rock Springs KOA late in the day and still needed to do laundry so didn’t get to do any exploring.
7/9- After listening to church on-line this morning we headed out to explore the area. We love to see things that the average person passing through an area must miss, so it was time to do some off-roading to find those hidden spots. The first place we headed toward was Boar’s Tusk, a dormant volcanic structure. https://www.blm.gov/visit/boars-tusk Half the fun of any adventure is the getting there and we had a wonderful time turning down various dirt roads and finding areas to explore before finally arriving at Boar’s Tusk. We were the only people there and we got to take our time exploring all side of the structure.
On our way to Boar’s Tusk we had seen a sign pointing off to White Mountain Petroglyph Site so we backtracked and headed up another dirt road to see it. It was a slight hike to the mountain and it was difficult to make out some of the very faint drawings but still a worthwhile detour.
Then it was back into town to refill our gas tank and head down towards Green River, Wyoming where we wandered around until we found the entrance to the old Lincoln Highway which was the first coast to coast highway established in 1913. https://www.visitlaramie.org/things-to-do/scenic-drives/old-lincoln-highway/ Most people tour the Wyoming’s Northern portion which has several historical sites to see along the way but we caught the south portion from Green River to Rock Springs. First we had to find how to get on it and that took a bit but finally right next to a cemetery we found a dirt road that was part of the highway. In many places the Old Lincoln Highway runs very close to what is Interstate 80 today and we could see modern day traffic roaring by as we imagined the traveler’s from the early 1900’s driving almost as slow as we had to go down the road. Occasionally we could see parts of broken pavement but most of the road was now just dirt. We were able to get pictures of cliffs along our route but by the time we reached paved road again just south of our campsite we were ready to call it a day.
Tomorrow we head off toward South Dakota and more adventures.
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