central idaho

Talulah rolled us down the mountain like a spinning seed on the wind,

then she rolled us back up the mountains into Hailey where we stopped at a restaurant for a shockingly delicious supper (he had lamb, I chose the gaucho steak). We felt a tad out of place. We felt grubby and under dressed. RW’s curls were more feral looking than usual and I was sporting sun blasted cheeks with braids wrapped up and over the top of my head.

We looked like an Irish fisherman and his wife.

Despite our greatest efforts, our boots loudly clomped us over to a corner table, we leaned in together and quietly talked or sat in easy silence while listening to the hilarious, high-end conversations swirling around us. When we left, we tipped big, because even though we found ourselves bobbing about in a senseless sea of ill-informed snobbery, the food was incredible and the service wonderfully smooth and relatively invisible.

Camping that night, just up the pass from Ketchum, was very cold and wet. The conifers wore fresh white in the morning and I was chilled to the marrow and beyond.

We coasted back down the mountain for hot drinks and breakfast. I bought and wrote silly postcards for friends and family.

RW had a drippy nose.

Later that morning, we chugged over Galena pass in the Sawtooths at 8701 feet — the highest highway summit in the Northwest! Winter combed her cold fingers over our rig, Plum shivered on the back seat, I could feel the frost creeping through the fibers of my very being. Alabaster breath pouring from my lips. RW drove with his fists shut tight, steering with the soft sides of his wrists. Some places are harder to thaw than others, just like people, spring can come slowly or not at all.

We found Stanley, faint green, at the base of the Sawtooth front and trickled out of town beside the roar of the Salmon River. A brief stop at Sunbeam hot springs allowed me to stand in my galoshes in hot water and thaw out my feet. We slipped into the heart of Idaho, up through Challis, and finally to the destination of the day, Goldbug hot springs. A few miles of uphill hiking took us into the quintessential Idaho hot springs complete with a spectacular view and a stiff, cold wind.

To my left, an ancient juniper. To my right, a roaring waterfall, behind me, RW sunning himself on a boulder and below me, the mountains tumbling away into forever.

I hummed to myself, as I soaked:

…we run like a river

runs to the sea

we run like a river to the sea…

[U2]

The golden hour arrived and we made our way up to Salmon and then started out across the majestic Lemhi Valley towards home. There was an eternal hunt for a place to camp, gale force winds that tried to push the bus off the highway, the wrong BLM road that took us to:

a herd of black angus,

a split rail fence,

Talulah stalling,

a short and tidy spat due to low blood sugar and freezing temperatures,

apologies,

a rock behind the back wheel of the bus and four hands steering, shifting and pulling the e-brake off.

There was a campsite finally, out of sheer desperation, in the middle of the sage flats on federal land, a full moon, an empty fuel canister, cold soup for dinner, the slap of the wind on the side of Talulah as we slept fitfully through the night, spooned up tight against each other, my arm reaching out of my own sleeping bag to wrap around the warmth of RW’s shoulders.

In the morning, the unforgettable and lonesome Lemhi Valley.

Desolate and wild.

Snow capped in the sun and blanketed in sage as far as the eye could see.