A wet and gloomy day

The windshield wiper for the driver’s side had become confused. It worked but sought new and unnecessary territory, sliding off the windshield down the front of the van, or off into the air to the left, where it flailed in seeming distress. In a snowstorm on Galena Summit in the Sawtooth Mountains this failure was particularly worrisome….

The snow was coming down sideways, and the fierce wind buffeted the high-sided van. We crept slowly up the steep incline, and I hunched over the wheel peering out the clouded windshield. The snow was a couple inches deep on the summit, but still wet on the road. The descent was scarier than the climb. I tried to keep our speed down and hoped we didn’t hit any ice.

I thought once we got out of the mountains and south down into the desert, we would leave the precipitation and gray skies behind. But no. Rain followed us into Twin Falls, where we sought out the Buffalo Café, a small place in the industrial part of town. We had stopped briefly in a McDonald’s parking lot in Hailey so Alix could conduct online research for lunch opportunities; the high number of recommendations had brought us to the Buffalo.

Inside the people were all locals, and I was the only man not wearing a ball cap. The wood-paneled walls were hung with buffalo art, and many items on the menu included gravy, and the first item in the list of sides was “Cup of gravy.” Alix had a french dip and I ordered a hamburger but not the one with gravy.

After lunch in the downtown section we visited three thrift stores, the Salvation Army, St. Vincent de Paul, and Idaho Youth Ranch, all within a couple blocks of each other. Large stores, but rather grim. And we found nothing. Later we stopped at the Idaho Youth Ranch store in Mountain Home, to the north, but again, fail.

I worried Alix was disappointed, but no, she said, the big fish still made the trip an acquisitional success. Earlier in the afternoon I’d grown tired and Alix took over driving while I lay down in the back next  to the marlin. There was room for both of us but just barely.

In the evening we arrived in Boise, and the first part of the trip came to an end.