Idaho - Days 10 - 12 - in the Arco campground

Craters of the Moon/Arco KOA, Arco

Sunday, 10 through Tuesday, 12 July 2022

This is the view we had every day from the RV.  That's 6 of the 8 horses that use that field daily.  Out of view on the right is a paddock with a little shelter and food.  As far as I could tell, the horses were allowed to decide for themselves whether or not they wanted to go out into this field.  All I know is that each morning, I saw them come out of the paddock, sometimes one or two at a time, sometimes all in a big bunch.  Sometimes they'd be walking out slowly, and at others they'd come prancing out, or chasing each other.  

Once during the day I saw all 8 of them running around, chasing each other, acting like dogs playing.  One was so excited he was bouncing around - kicking up his front feet and then his back feet.  At other times, they were incredibly sedate.  Not really a lot of action but it gave us something to look at from time to time.

I was a little worried that Dext would try to run over and get at the horses when we walked by (and drag me with him), but he never did.  Maybe that stint we did at the fairgrounds in Moses Lake got him used to being around horses.  And of course he's behaving very differently now without Gracie.  Do you suppose she was the instigator of trouble all this time that I've been blaming Dext for it?

While we stayed here, the temps barely got as high as the 90s, and there wasn't a lot of humidity.  So I was surprised at how hot it felt, even in the 80s.

I finished the last 3 Washington posts - finally (though better than the last couple of months) - and after much agonizing wrote the post about the Dobbs decision.

This campground has a modest-sized dog park (with almost no shade) and I kept trying to find a playmate for Dext, with no luck.  A couple of times I thought I'd found someone, only to see Dext do some vigorous sniffing and then lose interest.  But it's only been 6 weeks since Gracie died, and I'm not exactly over it myself, so I'm not at all worried about him grieving still.  It's reasonable, given what she meant to him.

This KOA had an area that was used mainly by groups of people using tents; it was less desirable than other tent areas with trees, but it was bigger.  I saw a group of Boy Scouts (I think) with about 15 individual tents.  And I saw one group with federal government license plates and another with Colorado plates.  

And I saw a group of geology students (I think from Illinois) who had spent one day at Craters of the Moon and were on their way the next day to Dillon, MT.  I was curious what was there, and the student I talked to didn't know, but online I learned that Dillon has extensive public land so is heavily used by geology students to learn how geology works in the real world.  As far as I could find online, there's nothing wildly unique about the area's geology (not like Craters of the Moon, for instance); the point is that it's an area that's open and available for use by those learning geology.

Speaking of geology, this hill loomed above the campground.

Apparently known as Number Hill, the town of Arco sits right at the base of it.

I don't know why my photo doesn't look as clear here as it should, but those are the graduation years of each Butte County High School class since 1920.

This campground offers a short menu that you can order from and they'll deliver food to your campsite.  I'd been wanting a pizza for several weeks and was all set to ask them to deliver one to me, but I couldn't get my tummy to cooperate.  It didn't feel as bad as it has those times when it was some kind of intestinal virus, but it also didn't feel like it would be really happy to be receiving a pepperoni pizza right now either.  So I reluctantly put the idea on hold.

I'd intended to do several driving trips between the next several campgrounds, trying to get to places I haven't seen in this area.  But I've been so worried about the state of my brakes that I finally told myself to be sensible, and I rerouted my drives to be the most direct routes from one campground to the next.  That made Google very happy, unlike our usual fights over scenic routes.  I hope I'll have a chance later to come back this way, but I'm not making any plans beyond my repair appointment, just in case the repairs take longer than they think.