Birthday Adventures

My mother's birthday always falls at the same time as the deer hunt, so, while her husband John goes hunting we always go for a birthday adventure. Usually we head south, to the warmth, but this year she wanted to check out Lava Hot Springs in Idaho. After two weekends of horrible weather (one even involving snow) we were blessed with the perfect Indian Summer ever! We left Friday night to go up to Greg's where we were going to be spending the night. Of course, in usual birthday adventure, we accidentally got off the freeway, got lost, found our way back, and then ended up scaring the guy tailgating us with Mom's crazy driving, but we eventually got there in one piece.

The next day, after a leisurely morning, we headed off to Idaho. We stopped in Preston for lunch at this fun little diner (it's across from the bowling alley that was filmed in Napoleon Dynamite). What made it so fun is that it's also an antique store so you're eating amongst all the old prizes.













Since this was very much a road trip we just enjoyed ourselves with stops at random pumpkin patches or a juant down a dirt road to get that perfect Autumn shot. Here's some of the places we saw...







































Finally we got to our destination. It was so nice. We went to the hot springs that were at the inn rather than the public ones so that it was a bit quieter. The water was awesome! The big pool was like bathwater and they got hotter from there. How nice is it to be out in your swimsuit in October, in Idaho! It was the best afternoon ever...