It was gratifying to cross the Snake River in the afternoon, just upriver of Hell's Canyon. That is where the Oregon Trail pulled away from the Snake River after following it for a couple hundred miles, ever since Fort Hall in southeastern Idaho. This morning I had been on the California Trail, near the Humboldt River in Nevada. What would the pioneers think?!
Now I can think of being in the Inland Northwest. Exactly where had the Southwest ended? Probably at the last Joshua Tree near Beatty, NV. And what a way to start the Northwest -- or any place! -- it was cool and dry. (By mid-summer Boise will be about as bad as Phoenix!) The mountains are still pretty with snow, and the rivers are full.
My little dog and I are now camped at the bottom of a scenic river canyon. The river is just a tributary of the Snake, but it flows fast, perhaps with higher flow than the Rio Grande in New Mexico? A BLM employee came by to clean the restroom. I tested my Spanish on him. It has become bad. He preferred to try to speak English. He tried hard. It is funny how two people can still joke around in broken language. I teased him about calling himself 'Alex' instead of Alessandro.
Cameras don't do a great job at photographing softer topographies such as hills. But I loved pedaling up these hills and looking at them.
You wouldn't think that pedaling up the road in the photo below would involve 1000 feet of elevation gain, but it did. Although pulling a trailer is a nuisance in some ways, it can also be an advantage: pedal up a road, find new campsites, and then come back and move the trailer. It is a game of leapfrog between the bike, the road, and the trailer. Think of the mountain bike as an exploratory probe that is sent in, first.
The hills were greener than the photos show. I love going to places where I don't see van nomad after van nomad or other tourists.
Comments
A very beautiful location. Enjoy.
There isn't much point in making static scenery into a video. And "talking heads" are pretty boring too.
Sadly there are more and more bloggers that don't understand this.I have been following a couple of blogs for sometime now that are moving away from the written word to presenting a 'talking head'. Since I can't hear them well enough to understand what they are saying their videos get a pass and soon their blogs will also get a pass.
Or they just talk, talk, talk to the camera. There is no action. They don't need video, they need radio.
Perhaps bloggers who go the video direction should hire professional performers to read their stuff to the camera. They should hire pretty young women, thin, fake blond hair, perfect white teeth, and with nice legs.
Then I might watch; it wouldn't matter that I couldn't hear what they have to say.