Idaho, home sweet home

We are gradually unpacking and settling in to our new home in Boise, Idaho.  It took us 8 days and 7 nights traveling across the USA to get here. Our dog learned about motels, hotels and elevators. He was a very good traveler.

Except for the first day, the traveling was easy and the interstate highways clear.  We learned never to go near the metropolitan NYC area on a Friday. That was a nightmare. We detoured through Long Island so I could pray at my parents' graves.  We made it 15 minutes before the cemetery closed for the sabbath even though we had left early in the morning.  Then it took us another 3 hours to go 35 miles to get to our hotel in NJ.  We had picked a chain of hotels (Red Roof Inn) that accepts dogs and does not charge extra for them. We stayed in many of them along our route.

Leaving NJ, we went first to the cemetery where my husband's mother was buried.  Then we followed our GPS back to the main highways and onto Route 80.  For the most part we were on Interstate 80 across NJ, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska and Wyoming into Utah.  Then we picked up Route 84 to Idaho.  The GPS was easy, we set it each morning for the next evening's hotel.  We tried to do around 350 miles per day with the last day a big one of 497 miles so we didn't have an extra night in a hotel.  Altogether, we drove (taking 2 hours shifts) about 2900 miles across.  Even where there was construction, the traffic moved along.

The most interesting stop for me was in Iowa City, lots of public art. It is a lively college town.

I haven't found my oil paints yet, but I'm gradually unpacking all my studio items so I hope to get back to painting soon.  The piano will be tuned this week and I've already started practicing.  I unpacked all my sheet music already.

Our family has been stopping by to help and to say hello.  It feels really good to be near them.  I never expected to be moving at age 71, but I think this was a good decision for all.  We'll be going back east every summer and have an in-law apartment to stay in while we are there.  I look forward to that too.

I am gradually learning my way around.  After living in New England for so many years, Boise seems like a very big city to me, but I'm also happy to see the mountains surrounding the "Treasure Valley".  Once my knee is fixed (maybe in the fall), I'll be out hiking again.

We drove through the southern part of Wyoming and found it to be surprisingly flat.  After a while we did see some mountains.  We had been in Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons before so I was expecting the same kind of scenery.  Nebraska and Iowa were mostly farmer's fields of corn, also cattle, both black and brown. I did see one antelope in Wyoming and thought of the "Home on the Range" song.

I'll try to go back to posting on a more regular basis now that we are settling in. This has been a big adventure for us seniors and a good one.