Oh McCall, how I’ve missed you. 2015 was turning out to be a rough one and I looked forward to our week-long trip like a small child looks forward to Christmas morning. Mark’s dad had not been well and passed away in May. I found a lump in my neck in February that turned out to be cancer followed by surgery in April and treatment in June. This July trip was a peek into the window of normal again and I yearned to see, touch and smell all that I loved about this place.
We had a larger group this time, six rigs and 24 people. We secured our favorite pod campsite for four and two were set up in the pull-through sites next to us. Our kids are grownups now, our oldest Jeff had finished his first year of grad school at OU (Boomer Sooner!) and our younger son, Kevin just finished his third year at NAU. Mark and I were so excited to have another family vacation with them and jump for joy when they want to vacation with us.
It was a two-day drive for everyone and our estimated arrivals were within a few hours of each other. I thought a scavenger hunt for the drive would be a fun way to pass the time on the long drive. We sent out the list along with a list of rules; this group is very competitive and I knew cutting corners (aka cheating) needed to be dealt with at the start. We had 27 items on the list and three bonus points items. These bonus points items would be used to break any ties. I had no idea how much fun this was going to be! Our fabulous prize was a bag of trinkets: a t-shirt, water bottle, beer koozie, deck of cards and some candy. Throughout the planning of this trip, Mark referred to himself as Julie McCoy, Cruise Director from the TV show The Love Boat. Of course he had to have the correct ensemble for his role as Julie McCoy. We found a navy blue skirt at Goodwill before we left. He burst forth from our rig in full Julie McCoy regalia to review the scavenger hunt entries and award the coveted prize.
Mark’s cousin Keith and his family traveled from Southern California. They are a competitive bunch and fit just right with Mark and his brothers’ endless competition. Since photo record of each found scavenger item was needed, Keith had an idea of how to get an extra “welcome to state” sign. When they got close to the CA/NV line, he had his daughter Kelsey run to the back of their RV and take a picture of the Welcome to California sign on the other side of the road while his wife took a picture of the Welcome to Nevada sign. Kelsey didn’t quite understand the request because she took a picture of the back of the Welcome to Nevada sign. Oops. We still laugh at that. My funny moment came when we stopped in Idaho Falls for gas and I quickly ran into the store to get a bonus item from the list; a gas station receipt for something other than gas. Easy-peasy. I bought some candy and told the cashier all about our little game. And…promptly left without the receipt. Oops. We had pictures and texts flying back and forth marking off items on the list both days of our drive. It was fun to get a picture of what each other was encountering along the drive. Our friends Ron & Terri won the fabulous grand prize and celebrated like they won the lottery.
Six rigs and 24 people. We were a big group. Three families hadn’t been to McCall before and as the cruise directors, we wanted to make sure they fell in love with the area like we had. Our first day was a drive to Burgdorf and Warren. We’d had so much fun the last time and looked forward to doing it all again. The hot springs were just as I’d remembered them and we quickly changed into our swimsuits and got in the the warm water. There was a slight sulfur smell from the springs but we got used to it pretty quickly. There is one small pool, Jacuzzi sized that is super hot. It must be the closest to the spring outlet. Nobody ventured into it during our 2007 trip but several did this time. I could only get my feet in. Man oh man it was hot.
Our next stop was in Warren for lunch. The town looked exactly the same. We parked and went into the cafe for lunch. Those of us that had been before told the others how good the burgers and fries were. A lady came out from the back and her eyes got huge. Yes, ma’am, we are all here for lunch. One of our group had to use the restroom and was laughing when he came out. He said he heard her on the phone talking to someone asking for help. “24. 24 people are here. I need help now. Hurry,” was what he heard her bark into the phone. A few minutes later a woman slowly came down the street riding a quad. Such is life in a small town. We cleaned them out of burgers and chicken fingers and they didn’t have any potatoes for french fries, bummer. I think the grill was tiny as the food took longer than I remembered. No worries, we were on vacation. While we waited a young couple came in for lunch. I felt bad as they each ordered a burger only to be told they were out. We must have caused quite a commotion because pretty soon the resident old timer was on the porch chatting up the guys in our group. He told them about his family’s mining operation that was about to start up again. He even told them where it was! My brother-n-law Matt and our friend Matt both went off to find it. They got back just before the last of our group was finishing lunch. There really was a mine and we were headed there when we left.
The mine was right where the old timer said it would be. It was quite clear that this operation had stopped many many years ago. Grass and bushes had grown through many of the different pieces of equipment. One of the buckets had a date stamp of 1941 on it. It was so cool to envision how modern mining was done 70 plus years ago. The startup of this mine was to happen in the coming months before winter and the old timer said they were going to be featured on a PBS special. Who knows if it was true or not; it sure was fun being out there. Felt like we’d found our own treasure.
We’d made reservations ahead of time and paid most of our excursions (see what I did there with the cruise lingo?). Monday was our white water rafting adventure day. And as luck would have it, the only day of our entire trip that was cold and rainy. So cold and rainy that the company photographer was not at any of the great picture spots. At one point the it was raining so hard and we were all so cold that the water in the river was the warmest thing around. Not every cruise excursion is an A+ event. We had fun no matter the conditions and I look forward to doing it all again with each of them on a bright warm and sunny day.
The next day was a perfect Idaho summer day. We set out to kayak at the top of the lake just like we’d done years before. The same lady was there running the rentals. It’s nice how some things don’t change. We grabbed our kayaks and paddle boards and set off up the calm waters where the Payette River dumped into the Payette Lake. I was looking for that wolf, or any wolf. I wanted to see what I’d missed out on during the last kayak trip. Sadly we didn’t see a wolf. We saw lots of fish and a couple deer. And a moose. A great big moose munching on berries right at the edge of the water! There we sat in complete silence for a long time watching this creature eat. You’ve never seen 24 people be so still. The moose was thoroughly into whatever he was eating.
Our son Jeff is an NCAA athlete we are proud to say; on the OU Curling Team. It’s officially a club sport and the team qualified for the national championship tournament in March. If you haven’t tried curling, I highly encourage you to give it a try. McCall has an ice rink in town and Jeff sold us on giving curling a try. Mark contacted the ice rink and got the phone number for the McCall Curling Club. They were happy to have us down to the rink for a fun filled night of prolonged lunges and high cardio sweeping on the ice. First, they showed us proper form and balance and we practiced the long lunge involved in releasing the stone (the big thing that goes down the ice). Mark’s mom and stepdad, Gail & Dave, decided they would watch, take pictures and fetch us beverages when we needed them. After we’d mastered sending the stone, mastered is such an optimistic word, we broke off into teams and were ready to go.
In a nutshell, curling is kind of like shuffleboard on ice. The ice is prepped in a technique called pebbling and Jeff tells me dedicated curling ice is a wonderful thing. We were on a multi-use municipal sheet of ice which Jeff termed as “mountainous.” Okay, so we weren’t beginning on perfect ice and none of us were ever going to be an Olympic curler (excluding Jeff and a couple of the kids of course). The kids took to it right away; strategizing and expertly curling their stones exactly where they wanted to. We parents on the other hand, not so much. It took a while to finally get it that you don’t hurl the 44-pound stone down the ice. You slide longer and more controlled and you gently release the stone from your grasp with a subtle move of your hand to either curl it to the left or to the right. Yeah, whatever. Sweeping is a cardio event, let me tell you. The act of sweeping removes friction and allows the stone to travel farther. You can affect the speed and direction of a stone traveling toward your “end” or help an opponents stone get out of the circles of that “end” you are trying to score in. The “end” is the giant target at each end of the sheet you’re playing on.
We were the farthest play sheet away from the stands where my dear in-laws were sitting. We could see her taking pictures and enjoying her bottle of water. We had long finished our water and were parched as parch can be. We waved at them to get their attention and they nicely waved back. We waved again and make drinking motions with our hands. They waved back. Hmm, so much for them being our waitress when we were thirsty. Onto Plan B and get it ourselves. After we’d played a few games our time was up and it was time to go. Everyone raved at how much fun it was and commented on how sore we might be in a couple days. Sore is right. Mark and I exercise a lot and I was still surprised at how sore we were. “Damn you Jeff” was heard a time or two from people as they walked out of their rigs.
No X-Games vacation is complete without some sort of daredevil adventure. Zip-lining in Tamarack was up next. The company couldn’t accommodate all of us at once so 12 went in the morning and 12 went after lunch. There were seven zips on our ride on various parts of the ski mountain. As you can see in the pictures, the views were spectacular.
We’d zipped before in Park City, UT but that’s just one line that you can do over and over. These were down ski runs, over streams and even one zip into a tree. That one was my favorite. The two guides were very patient and made sure we were safely strapped into the zip every time. Keith is not a fan of heights and had never zipped before. The guides took great care of him and minus zipping into the tree, he had fun. Matt and I certainly didn’t help the whole zipping into the tree thing. We were the first two and neither of us were fazed that we were in a tree stand, 40 feet up in the air. The tree swayed with the wind and we helped it sway more. We were having a grand old time. Keith, not so much. I promised Keith I wouldn’t make any other trees sway; good thing we didn’t land in any more trees. The last zip was over a stream and between a couple trees. It was yet another fun action-packed day.
The dads had an adventurous morning our last day riding down the ski runs at Brundage Ski Resort. While they did that, my girlfriend Terri and I walked around downtown McCall. We found the jail, the old original one that’s now a little museum, and found a cute store to buy Christmas ornaments.
We ended our week with an afternoon horseback ride with dinner with the same company we’d used in 2007. The wranglers took us up into the forest to a large meadow. Those wranglers had their hands full with us. Mark’s brother Matt was on a horse that didn’t like to mind which fit him perfectly. Matt had Stetson going hither and yon throughout much of the ride. I hope the wranglers had as much fun as we did watching the action of Matt and Stetson. We circled back to the stables where a cowboy dinner was waiting for us. Ribs, corn, soft dinner rolls and more cookies than we could eat (believe me, I tried to make a dent in them!). It was the perfect end to this wonderful trip. It was also Ron and Terri’s 28th wedding anniversary which called for several celebratory toasts. We ate and talked with the wranglers about our last time riding with them. Some of the horses we’d ridden in 2007 were still alive and doing well which was good to hear.
As we recounted all the fun we’d had that week, I looked around at this group. My people. This very group that I longed to spend time with while worrying about that horrible C word I’d heard in April and through my treatment. All was right in the world that week and I can’t wait to do it all again.