We love Boise!

Yesterday we went our separate ways on the Boise greenbelt path.  Mark rode his bike and I went for a run.  The greenbelt paved trail is right at our campground.  There are many spots where trees canopy above and shade the trail.  Boise is called the City of Trees and it seems they all line this path.  We have always turned right and gone through town so we decided to turn left.  Turns out it was only 3.5 mi until the trail ended so I ran a very happy 7 miles and Mark had to ride the other direction to get in an hour ride.  We passed a couple small lakes, many blackberry bushes (that just aren’t in season yet), and the city sewer plant (which surprisingly did not smell.)

The main blog image is of me getting ready to eat at Boise Fry Company. I was pretty excited! If you ever come to Boise you have to try this place. They have about 12 different types of potatoes and you can get them cut several ways. Just trust me.

The afternoon topped out at 96F so to beat the heat, we hit the river.  You can rent tubes, float lazy river style down the Boise River and then get a shuttle back to your car.  The water was chilly and clear, but in that heat, felt so refreshing.  We loved having a relaxing, nothing to do kind of day as we just floated along.  We grabbed some pizza in town for dinner and came back to take Molly for an evening constitutional.

We are so impressed with Boise. 

We’ve covered a lot of the city on foot, on a bike, and in a car.  It is very clean, no trash or litter, no graffiti, no potholes or seamed up roads.  We haven’t seen a single homeless person or panhandler, even downtown.  The bike lanes on the road are wide and it seemed they were on every street, except downtown.  In some places, there were large curbs guarding the bike lanes from cars.  The parks actually had maintained grass, not just mowed weeds like many of the Colorado Springs parks.  It seems like it sure would be a great place to live, and definitely somewhere we will return to visit again.

This morning we rode our bikes together on the Boise greenbelt all the way to the opposite end of town.  Because so many people enjoy the path, you can’t really get going very fast, but it’s just so pleasant to enjoy an easy ride and see some of the town we can’t get to on foot.  There are homes along the river and what a view they have every day!  We were about 10 miles into our ride, when I felt an immediate and very painful sting next to my knee. It was a bee.  My front wheel was going every which way as I was flicking it off of me while Mark, not knowing what was happening, was shouting from behind as he was following me fairly closely.  What you may not know is that I’m allergic to bee stings.  I’ve had localized but significant swelling at the sting site, but nothing requiring a hospital in the past.  However I’ve been warned that subsequent stings can potentially bring an increased reaction.  We were fairly close to town so as we started riding back, Mark asked the first people we came to where the nearest Walgreens was.  It was within a mile from where we were so we rode over and bought some Benadryl and I took it within 10 minutes of the incident.  We decided to continue the ride and I continued to self evaluate.  Basically, about every 100 feet or so, I’d ask myself, “Can I still breathe?  Ok, I’m good.”  We ended up riding 25 total miles for the morning and by the time we got back to camp, the pain and swelling had subsided and I lived to tell the tale. I did happen to find one blackberry bush with a few ripe berries that we enjoyed right on the trail.  I don’t know of any simpler life pleasure than hand picking sweet berries and eating them straight from the bush.  Blackberry bushes are everywhere here, but we’re just a week or two before the season where most of them will be ripe.

Though not as hot today but still in the 90s, we decided to see a movie.  We hit Trader Joe’s in town for a few grocery items, my favorite winery next door, Snake River Winery, where I had half a case of wine shipped home, and then we saw “The Legend of Tarzan.”  It wasn’t what I was expecting, but I enjoyed it nonetheless.  We came back to camp to do laundry and some chores before our long drive tomorrow.  We’ll be heading to Mt. Rainier National Park in WA, but it’s about 450 miles away so it’ll be a long day of driving and hopefully no stories to tell while en route.