Into Idaho - Day 2

May 4
After a fine sleep at Clyde Holliday State Park, we were up and moving by a little after 9. It's beginning to look like the weather will push us to some degree as a system is forming that's going to turn the whole western USA into a shitstorm for a few days over the weekend. With our motivation thus heightened, moving becomes a higher priority.

We're aiming for the Craters of the Moon National Monument in Idaho. Neither of us have visited this place in the past and it's right along an east/west route segment we've likewise not taken before. So the decision was made to set course, without haste, for CRMO.

The route used US-26 from John Day to Ontario, I-84 through Boise to Mountain Home, then US-20 up and over to Carey ID. A bit bedraggled from the longish 300+ mile drive, we found an agreeable camp along a creek on BLM land about 8 miles south of Carey.

Tomorrow, which the weather gods have predicted will still be mostly sunny and nice, the plan is to explore Craters of the Moon NM. From our camp, it's only a short drive on US-26 between Carey and Arco.

The drive today was a mix of high forested mountains and low agricultural land. The section of US-20 in Idaho was through the high (5,000 feet or so) Camas Prairie, that was known to some emigrants in the mid-1800s as the Goodale Cutoff, an alternative to the Oregon Trail that made travel somewhat easier.

There aren't an overabundance of camping spots through the Camas Prairie. The few we checked out were suffering from one deficiency or another until we snagged this one along Silver Creek south of Carey.