Aug. 3-11, 2013
When we heard the Tullis Family Reunion was going to be in McCall, Idaho we decided we needed to take the opportunity to explore a bit of Idaho that we had never been to before.
We spent the first night in Boise, tackling a few of the local breweries, I even found a beer that I enjoyed, called SWILL, the summer seasonal for the 10 Barrel Brewery.
On Sunday we headed up the Bogus Ski Area and went past the ski area up to the trailhead for Mt. Mores. We hiked about 3.5-4 miles around the rim of the mountain. It was quite warm, in the high 80’s low 90’s. Too hot for this Alaskan, but not for Harry.
Hot hike up Bogus Basin outside of Boise
highest point on Morse Mountain
We were then able to hit the brewfest in Nampa before heading to some other friends for the evening in Eagle.
However, the real adventure began on Monday morning when we headed eastward then N up to Haley, Sun Valley and eventually into the Copper Canyon and Wildhorse Basin.
beautiful wildflowers
Once we arrived to the Wildhorse Basin we knew we’d hit the jackpot of Idaho, and the fact that we’d been given an upgrade at our car rental to a Jeep, helped us quickly decide to take the remote road as far as we could.
beautiful flowing falls
need to look up what these were but they were beautiful
In the end it took us over an hour to travel 3.5 miles. The logging road we took seemed to be mostly traveled by ATV’s these days, but we made it in the Jeep! At the end we hiked in about another mile or so and the valley was just spectacular. On the way out we stopped and took some photos of the old mine.
the peak at the end of the trail. Must have been at about 11,500-12,000 feet
However, what both of us agreed to be the highlight of the trip was where we camped that night. After coming back off the ATV road we decided to not camp at the campground, (there were only 2 spaces full, but they were the only 2 on the river) but rather to set up our tent on the riverbed. There were so many “almost heart rocks” that we
almost heart rock beach
decided to call our campsite the ‘almost heart’ site. 
The sky was so clear that we saw more stars that night than we’ve ever seen, even more than on Mauna Kea (13,803 feet) in Hawaii. It was spectacular. We saw the Milky Way and many constellations as well satellites passing in the sky. We could tell that with such a clear sky that it was going to be a cold night, but we never imagined it would get down to freezing but it did.
the view from our tent
As we awoke in the morning we saw the sun rise over the mountain peak and knew we’d already had THE highlight of the trip. But we continued onward. We drove the loop through Copper River Basin, which was also worth the time. Eventually we made it back to Sun Valley by noon and continued our adventure toward Stanley. Everyone had told us we’d love it there but neither of us know what to expect.
It was a quaint little town, almost like one of the ghost towns in N Arizona. It also reminded me of Nenana, AK or any smallllll town USA. There was the main road through town and about 3 turn offs, making it easy to see all of town. We ate pizza for lunch, filled up with gas and stopped at the visitor center. The woman told us that the area we wanted to visit had a recent fire and that the ‘scenery’ wasn’t what it used to be. Hence we continued to another location.
the heart rocks at the hot springs camp site
harry enjoying the hot springs.
Eventually we ended up in Bonneville Campgrounds, established in the location most likely because of the natural hot springs that were about ¼ mile from our tent. We enjoyed them both in the evening and again the next morning. It was perfect for both of us because Harry could sit in the HOT area and I could lounge where the hot water met the cold river water creating just the right temperature for me!
That day we drove a scenic route through a gorge headed towards McCall. It again was magnificent. We kept commenting on how nice it would have been to have our motorcycles for this trip. We followed a river towards the west and then another one North. The one that was flowing south as we drove north had amazing rapids and turbulent waters, very pretty.
We arrived into McCall right around the time we could check into our condo. We quickly found the brewery before Marcia came to take us to their house on the lake, the gathering spot for the reunion.
there had been a fire about 18-20 years ago
The next few days were full of family, fun, laughs and memories. 
Harry and I hiked up to Canyon Lake, it was steep and it was hot, and combining those elements with the high elevation, I was pooped! We also canoed with John/Liz and Michael /Debbie down the river for a few hours, another fun adventure. Sharing the condo with April, Carol and the twins Jason and Morgan was also a blast.
the Tullis kids, Tom, Marcia, John, Harry and Karen, we missed Jim, Kathy and Jack
Thursday night the family had dinner at the pizza place, Friday night everyone brought things to BBQ and we ate at the house on the lake and Saturday night most everyone gathered at Tom and Ann’s (+family_) campsites for more BBQ fun. 
We missed those not there, but hope to see them all at the next gathering.
timistravels 