Rivers, mountains and wide valleys riding from Idaho to Wyoming

 We started today in Salmon, ID  and started riding south on US 93 along the Salmon River. This part of US 93 is the Salmon River Scenic Byway as it curves and twists following the Salmon River past large rolling hills and rocky mountains.

Once we passed Challis, ID US 93 now is part of the Peaks to Craters Scenic Byway. The ride so far today is one of the most beautiful and fun motorcycle roads we've been on this trip.

We rode through part of the Lost River Valley until in Arco we turned east on US 26. Arco ID which in 1955 was the first town in the world to be lit by electricity generated by atomic power for 1 hour. Today the Idaho National Laboratory continues work with nuclear energy.

US 26, and then US 20 are mostly flat and straight with long range views of ranch land until we worked our way through Idaho Falls and turned once again onto US 26 east.

We rode along the Snake River that starts in Yellowstone National park, flows through Grand Tetons National park, and eventually meets the Columbia River in Washington. 

The Snake River is dammed to create the Palisades Reservoir to provide hydroelectricity, but like so many of the lakes, rivers and reservoirs in the West the water level is extremely low - about 21% full.

We crossed into Wyoming and then rode a short stretch of US 89 south from Alpine to Afton where we've stopped for the night. It was a wonderful day on the BMW, twisting along rivers and mountains, riding straight stretches bordered by ranch land, and enjoying just about perfect weather conditions for late August. We'll be ready to ride into northwestern Colorado tomorrow, looking forward to more mountains.

Mountains, rivers and fields in Wyoming and Idaho

 Day 3 of our motorcycle trip started in Rock Springs, Wyoming, heading north on US 191. For the first two hours we rode through a flat, arid landscape with no trees. Occasionally a dirt track wound off into the far-off Wind River Range that looked like faint shadows in the horizon.

Eventually we started climbing and the landscape changed to rolling hills and green bushes and trees as we entered the Bridger-Teton National Forest.

As we continued north we rode between the Wind River Range to the east and the Wyoming Range to the west.

We came to the first river for today and rode alongside the Hoback River, a major tributary of the Snake River, through a steep-walled canyon topped with pine trees.

In Hoback Junction the Hoback River flows into the Snake River, and we turned west on US 26, following the Snake through another canyon.

US 26 then runs for miles along Palisades Reservoir as we entered Idaho. It had been cool in the morning with temperatures in the 60's, but as we descended below 6000' elevation, the temperatures rose into the 80's. 

US 26 continues west through Swan Valley, home to much of Idaho's agriculture with endless, vibrant green fields backed by mountains.

We're more in touch with our surroundings riding the BMW vs driving in a car - feeling the wind and sun, noticing the different smells in forests, watching hawks and osprey soar overhead. It was a bit jarring to end our day on a 4-lane highway in Idaho Falls, and we look forward to more country miles tomorrow as we continue north toward Canada.

Snowy mountains and lush farmland

 I put on all of my warm liners plus raingear before we left Kemmerer, WY this morning due to cool weather (temperature in the low 50's) and high chance of rain/thunderstorms. We started off under clear blue skies, riding west on US 30.

We passed herds of sheep and cattle as we rode straight west, then turned north on US 89.

We watched the snow-capped mountains get closer, and then the wide-open valley narrowed as we climbed up the Salt River Pass, one of the routes used by the California, Oregon, and Mormon wagon trains.

We continued on 89 north through Star Valley, bordered by the Salt River mountain range in western Wyoming, and the Webster range in eastern Idaho. The 2-lane road sweeps and turns along the Snake River, which eventually dumps into the Columbia River. Due to the high amounts of snow this past winter and rainier than usual Spring, the Snake was churning brown water and often over its banks as we rode past.

We picked up US 191 north into Jackson, WY. The traffic increased as we rode north through several small towns and outlying ranches. One of our favorites is Afton, home to the largest elk antler bridge in the world.

Much of this route goes through the Bridger-Teton National Forest, 3.4 million acres of protected land.

We stopped for lunch in Jackson, and then turned west onto WY 22 over the Teton Pass. Even with 10% grades, it was one of the lower and tamer passes of our trip and definitely had a lot more traffic than we've seen so far on this trip.

The west side of the pass is in Idaho, the 4th state on this trip. We continued on ID 33 north, riding through rollercoaster hills in the lush farmland with views of the Grand Tetons to the east.

We had been watching dark rain clouds, and had a few miles of light rain before we rode out of the clouds and back into the sunshine. We turned north onto US 20 into Island Park, our stop for the night. There are less than 400 people who live in Island Park, which is one of the gateways into Yellowstone National Park.

We rode 269 miles today and were wowed by the landscape each mile: snowy mountains, green pastures, brown tilled fields, rolling hills, and overflowing rivers and streams. Tomorrow we have a shorter ride into Bozeman, MT where we'll stop for the Memorial Day weekend to visit our youngest son and his girlfriend before we continue on our trip back into Colorado.

The awesome scenery of Montana, Idaho and Washington on a 327 mile ride

We didn't expect today's 327 mile ride from Missoula, Montana to Walla Walla, Washington would take us through such a wide variety of landscapes while traveling primarily west on Route 12, the Lewis and Clark Highway.

We started riding south from Missoula on Route 93, and quickly joined Route 12 headed west over the Lolo Pass through the Bitterroot Mountains, with views of snow covered 9,137' Lolo Peak.

We stopped at the visitor center just before the Idaho state line, reading about the park, the Lewis and Clark expedition that traveled through this area in 1805-1806, and watched prairie dogs hard at work.

On this part of their journey, Lewis and Clark were searching for a river connection between the Columbia and Missouri Rivers. This area is part of the ancestral home of the Nez Perce who helped  guide the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Route 12 twists and winds its way west through northern Idaho, hugging first Lolo Creek and then the Lochsa River. We knew we were in for fun when we saw this sign:   

 

We zoomed our way through the dense cedar forest, watching the shallow, rocky bottom rivers flow alongside us. Mike quickly passed the few cars and trucks we came upon, giving us the opportunity to enjoy the curving, twisty road.

We stopped for lunch in Kamiah at the Hearthstone Bakery and Tea House on the Clearwater River. This was the waterway Lewis and Clark had been searching for, and they were finally able to build canoes and travel on the river instead of horseback.

The restaurant is beautiful inside, with tin ceilings and Victorian decorating touches. The sandwiches and salads were wonderful, and we looked longingly at the baked goods displayed in the front case.

Not far west from Kamiah we entered Lewiston, an industrial town of about 30,000 at the confluence of the Clearwater and Snake rivers. It's the most inland seaport on the West coast, 465 miles inland from the Pacific Ocean. We stopped at the 18th Street Bridge, the first bridge built across the Clearwater in 1913.

As we rode across the bridge over the Snake River, we entered Clarkston, Washington and the landscape changed completely. We were now in the Palouse, a region of large, round, rolling hills that were formed by centuries of wind blowing dust and silt and are today covered with wheat, barley, and grass - but no trees.

The size and scale of the hills is amazing. I spent most of the ride wondering how farmers were able to drive tractors up and over the sides of these steep, round hills. The wind is being put to good use with numerous large windmills scattered over the hill tops.

We ended the day riding into Walla Walla, only 13 miles north of the Oregon border. We're looking forward to tasting local wines and exploring the history of this area before we continue on our journey to Portland, OR.

Elko, Nevada to Boise, Idaho on the BMW motorcycle

Traveling on our BMW motorcycle gives us the opportunity to find less-traveled roads and explore parts of the country we would never see on the Interstate highway system.

Today we started in Elko, NV and rode 259 miles north to Boise, ID. We rode for 190 miles on Nevada 225/Idaho 51 before we made our first turn of the day.

Sagebrush lined the road with views of the Independence Mountains to the west. The only trees we saw were around isolated ranches; otherwise the land was covered in rocks or sagebrush.

The road twisted through the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, rising up and down and then sweeping around the steep, rocky hills that fell straight down to the narrow - or often nonexistent - highway shoulder.

We've been traveling through the high desert for the past two days on our trip from Arizona to Boise, Idaho and I was excited to see the Wild Horse Reservoir that stretched out into the valley. It was built in the 1930's to store water for irrigation, and is also stocked with trout and bass for fishing.

Owyhee, NV was the first town we came to - 97 miles after we started our trip today. It's on the Duck Valley Reservation, home to the Shoshone and Paiute tribes. Luckily there was one gas station/grocery store in town so we could take a break and fill up the tank.

We crossed into Idaho less than one mile from the gas station, and rode on what was now called Idaho 51 - the same road we'd been on all day, just renumbered from Nevada to Idaho. The first 43 miles the road shot straight through the flat landscape with sagebrush covering every visible area. This is open range country, with signs warning us to watch out for 'cows on the road'.

Then the road started curving and sweeping around rolling and rocky hills, keeping the ride interesting until we finally started seeing bright green, irrigated fields and towering stacks of hay.

We crossed the Snake River and left the isolation of a 2-lane highway with almost no traffic and no stop signs or traffic signals for a city highway with stores, gas stations, traffic and stoplights.

It's a shock to our system to see green grass, rivers filled with water instead of a mere trickle or dry, and city congestion. Boise is the capitol of Idaho, and the most populous city in the state with just over 200,000 people and over 600,000 in the metropolitan area.  Early settlers must have felt the same way, because the name "Boise" comes from the French traders who named the river "la rivière boisée" which translates to "the wooded river".

Tomorrow I run the Famous Idaho Potato marathon along the Boise River greenspace. We'll take a rest day from the motorcycle, then Sunday head for a 3-day trip home along a different route, looking for new roads to explore.