Meandering In My RV: Southeast Oregon and Southern Idaho

Oregon Trail ruts near
Oregon Trail Interpretive
Center

We had a short stay in Baker City, OR to go to the National Oregon Trail Interpretive Center. This facility is a combined BLM and NPS site and is outstanding. We've been to a number of Oregon Trail sites and they usually have information pertinent to that particular area. This one covers the journey from end-to-end and is very well done. There are Oregon Trail ruts that you can see with a bit of a walk.

We briefly checked out historic Baker City. We made a stop at the Chamber of Commerce Visitor Center and got a map of the historic buildings and drove around. We tried looking inside the historic

Gold Nuggets

Geiser Hotel but were stopped at the door saying guests only. We went into the US Bank to see their display of gold nuggets found in the area. That was pretty cool.

We moved on to Boise, ID to tour the Idaho State Capitol and visit a friend. The Capitol is very nicely done inside with white marble everywhere. It doesn't have any glitzy wow factor but it has a clean, inviting feel. A very nice building to make a small state, population-wise, proud.

Idaho State Capito

We left Boise heading to the Twin Falls area. We stopped at the Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument Visitor Center on our way. This park service site protects fossil beds as well as Oregon Trail ruts. There were no archaeological digs going on so we just enjoyed the displays and film at the visitor center. I wouldn't go way out of my way for this site but the drive on Hwy 30, which is called the Thousand Springs Scenic Byway, rather than on I-84 is a nice drive so you can "make it" on your way.

The Hagerman Horse

From our Twin Falls base we made a day trip up to Craters of the Moon National Monument. This is part of a very large area of lava and was given it's name because people thought it looked like the moon as viewed through a telescope. Lava is prominent for over a hundred miles in each direction. The visitor center is small but has the important geological information a visitor needs to know. There are some really neat lava flow formations at the North Crater Flow stop of the 7 mile crater loop road.

Cinder mound and lava flow at
Craters of the Moon NM

Lava flow at Craters of the Moon NM

We made another stop at the Minidoka National Historic Site near Jerome, ID. This was the site of a World War II Japanese Internment Camp. Basically nothing remains from that time except a few foundations but there is a path with a lot of interpretive signs. There is also a small visitor center so all of this gives a good understanding of the whole story including several photographs.

We were also able to get a look at the Snake River Gorge at Twin Falls. I was surprised to see roads to the bottom and all kinds of activity down there from golf courses to speed boats zooming up the river.