Week Nine aka ICE CREAM WEEK 2012

This was the week of trying out two new places and having a great deal of ice cream this week. Our first really wonderful experience was going to Village Ice Cream. http://www.villageicecream.com/ I had read that this place has huckleberry ice cream. Being a true Montana lover, there is nothing like huckleberry ice cream ... We ventured to an odd location just outside of downtown nearby the Saddledome. It was well worth the drive as one bite of CubJ’s ice cream and I was sure I was at our favourite KK7 in Glacier!

SparkJ had the Guide’s Mint which was the perfect balance of creamy and minty without giving you that “mouthwash” aftertaste. I tried the salted caramel which was creamy, smooth, salty and sweet in all of the very best ways. CubJ, wisely had the huckleberry ice cream. It was PERFECT. If you had closed your eyes, you would have sworn that you were in Montana. The people at Village Ice Cream are AMAZING ice cream makers. In fact, it was so good that the next night we would bring DaddyJ to try it out. He too felt like one bite of huckleberry was like all of the very best parts of our trip to Glacier wrapped up in one tasty little morsel! You really should try out this place.

Thursday, the weather was nice and I thought we should try out a little place one of my co-workers (FancyPants) has been telling me about. I figured that the summer is short, the weather was nice and how many other days would we have to make a run to Canmore for lunch, before school was back? With that in mind, we were off on our adventure.

La Belle Patate is a great little Quebec-French place in the industrial area of Canmore. They serve traditional Québécois cuisine with what FancyPants feels is the only "authentic Poutine in the west". As she is a native Montréal resident, I was inclined to believe this place was worth the drive.  La Belle Patate did not disappoint. SparkJ inhaled two steamed hot dogs and munched away on a plate of hand cut fries. CubJ enjoyed a plain cheese burger which he said was "awesome" and shared an order of classic poutine with me. I had the Montréal smoked meat sandwich which was piping hot, covered in mustard and not too fatty! It was the best smoked meat sandwich that I have had since I was last in Montréal. As for their famous poutine, it was fantastic. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. The fries are crispy on the outside and tender inside. The gravy is thick enough to coat the fries without reminding you of wall paper paste and not too salty! As SparkJ noted, the squeaky cheese was hilariously squeaky. It could be the best poutine that I have ever had anywhere. If you are in Canmore, I highly recommend La Belle Patate http://labellepatate.com/ the location is clean, bright and staffed with great people who make you feel very welcome. This could rival our love of the Grizzly Paw....

Post massive lunch, it was time to enjoy the sunshine with a trip to the park. The LittleJ’s enjoyed swinging, climbing and fooling around. CubJ even had the opportunity to discuss broken arms in French with a Quebecois mother who also had broken her arm. What a wonderful way to spend a summer afternoon.

Saturday saw us busy enjoying children’s activities and fulfilling commitments. Early Saturday morning, CubJ had a Cricket practice. The idea was that the television crews that were there to shoot some of the adult’s games would capture the kids and future of Cricket. All of the kids had a great time.

After that, DaddyJ, SparkJ and CubJ worked on painting our neighbour’s and our own fence. CubJ had committed to completing this work before the summer was over as a part of his taking on some odd jobs for them. It went very quickly, looks fantastic and seems to have been a fun experience for all.

 

Our next activity was attending the family wind up BBQ for CubJ’s cricket club. The parents and adults, including some very good Glenmore Cricket Club team members, played a game against one another which involved all of the siblings. Everyone had fun as we encouraged the kids, tried hard to keep it fair and ate some great East Indian food. I can tell you that the people involved with the Calgary Glenmore Junior Cricket Club are OUTSTANDING. These volunteers really put their heart and time into encouraging these kids. We are so lucky that CoachP and CoachA work so hard.

SparkJ had a great time playing with some friends and even played a bit of cricket at the bbq!

To cap off the Cricket year, we headed over to Amato Gelato where we traditionally end off the year with a double scoop of gelato. Needless to say, this did not escape the memories of the LittleJ’s so for the third time in one week, we had ice cream! It has been another great year of Cricket. I do home that CubJ will play for many more years to come. After he saw one of the big boys break his bat hitting a googly for the tv crews, I think that he might have his sights set on doing that one day! LOL

 

Week Nine was another great week of finding new and wonderful places to eat. We certainly ate more than our fair share of ice cream and we enjoyed every last bite. I hope that you will have the chance to try out both of these great places yourself soon.

Week Eight of Summer Vacation

It was an exciting and interesting week after returning from our trip. It began with a trip to see the Orthopedic Surgeon who is managing CubJ’s arm. We were pleased that the cast had survived the trip intact and confident that things were going to be far more healed than the last visit.

CubJ was rewarded with some serious bone growth around the break, in addition to the bones still being in ideal alignment. This was fantastic news as it meant that CubJ could graduate to a shorter cast! Yippie, only three more weeks in a short cast to ensure that this break would be behind him.

For me, Monday started out with getting something on my contact which cause me eye to swell up and turn red. This was very irritating, literally and figuratively. By Tuesday afternoon, this would seem far more pleasant than what was on my horizon! In the afternoon of Tuesday, Calgary experienced a MAJOR windstorm. The winds were measured at speeds of over 100km/hr, there were road signs ripped down on the highway, trees and houses damaged etc.

While this was going on, I heard our garbage bins blowing around the street. I was concerned that they would damage the house or such and went out to retrieve them. As branches were being ripped off the tree in the front yard, construction debris was flying down the street, I tried to collect the airborne garbage and recycling bins. While wheeling one up to the house, the wind caught the lid and the lid hit me in the bridge of the nose! Hands down, that was the most shocking pain of my life! The good news is that with a great deal of ice, vinegar and massaging the bruising went away quickly.

I did learn a few interesting things about sporting black eyes and a potentially broken nose as we ventured places all week. One, head up, no sun glasses and look people in the eye is the best way to deal with the questions. Two, people who know you well know that you have done something dumb like catching a garbage bin with your face. Three, most people have really good poker faces as they try to decide what has happened to you. Lucky for me, we still had fun going to the movies and Chainti’s with BuddyP and BuddyB!

CubJ branched out this week on our Thursday trip to Tubby Dog. He tried the Chunky Charlie dog. It has a bacon wrapped dog that has tuna salad and melted cheese on top! It is two of his very favourite things, a hot dog and tuna. I was so impressed that he branched out. He was impressed with just how yummy his dog was. Yeah CubJ, branching out can be fun.

On Friday, August 17^th, 2012 DaddyJ and I were able to attend the wedding of my lovely coworker, with the thoughtful and generous help of the 3SFamily (BuddyP, BuddyB and BuddyS). GroomR married the most beautiful BrideA on a picturesque sunny afternoon at the Nakoda Lodge on the Lake http://www.nakodalodge.com/ It was a perfect day to celebrate such a special occasion. What makes them such a wonderful pair is that they are even more lovely on the inside than they are on the outside. These are the type of people that I can only hope that CubJ and SparkJ grow up to be.

After enjoying the ceremony (complete with the help of a very talented makeup artist at Sephora Market Mall to cover the bruising) we returned to the 3SFamily’s house to enjoy a wonderful meal and a great visit. BuddyB made an amazing meal of grilled chicken and potatoes, tomato/cucumber/bocconcini salad, bread and this crazy amazing salad that has shrimp, carrots and Hickory Sticks, yes, those potato chip like straws. I must really be nicer to her so that she might make it for me again, LOL. The whole delightful meal was capped off with berries with ice cream.

 

 

To entertain themselves, BuddyP and CubJ played croquet and SparkJ made nice with cat! A great big thank you to the 3SFamily for making our day not only possible but so fantastic!

Week eight was an eventfull week. We are so thankful to all of the hard working staff that the Alberta Children's Hospital and everyone at the cast clinic for all that you do to heal all of our children who need you. This week, I was reminded of what a true blessing to have so many great friends, access to such amazing health care and to be enjoying the summer!

Heading home via Great Falls

To wrap up our road trip we once again stopped in Great Falls for the night at the Fairfield Inn. We did a bit of shopping, had lunch at the Macaroni grill and headed home at a leisurely pace.  

The highlight of our time there was CubJ getting himself a new paint ball marker at Scheels!

Thank you for the great Summer Road Trip 2012 DaddyJ, CubJ and SparkJ! This trip exceeded my expectations for fun, new adventures and interesting places. I look forward to the 2013 road trip....

I hope all of your summer adventures have been as fun,

MommyJ

Leg Three –Lava Hot Springs for some river tube adventures

Our next stop was only two hours away back in Idaho at Lava Hot Springs! We were there to take in the hot springs and try out some tubes in the river. I must say, that the LittleJ’s and I really enjoyed our first time on a massive tube in a real river, not a man made one at a waterpark!

 

Lava Hot Springs is a city in Bannock County, Idaho, United States. It is part of the 'Pocatello, Idaho Metropolitan Statistical Area'. The population was 521 at the 2000 census. Located in the mountainous valley of the Portneuf River on the old route of the Oregon Trail and California Trail, the city has become a popular resort location, noted for its numerous hot springs amenable to bathing and a turbulent inner tube run through part of the town.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lava_Hot_Springs,_Idaho

After a busy day of boating on Bear Lake and a sleepy warm drive to Lava Hot Springs, we were in the mood for some pizza for dinner. Armed with some good recommendations from the staff at our KOA and a local shop we popped into The Royal Pizza Parlor for the famous lava stone cooked pizza. The pizza was VERY very tasty! The real highlight of this pizza is the amazingly thin and crisp crust all topped with a perfect amount of toppings. The slice of lemon that they serve with your pizza is a nice addition. After dinner, we went to the local deli that has a huge selection of candy and ice cream. DaddyJ enjoyed some pralines and cream, CubJ some huckleberry and SparkJ had birthday cake ice cream.  

Since there is a massive fire ban due to the extremely dry conditions in both Lava Hot Springs and Bear Lake, when we returned to our KOA, we enjoyed a family game night instead of our usual reading around the fire. We started the night out with a National Parks Yatzee 4J’s tournament. SparkJ won the night in a tight match with only 5 points separating the winner from fourth place! After that DaddyJ and I showed the kids how to play checkers. I confess that after getting off to an overly confident start, I failed to keep a good eye on what DaddyJ was up to and lost horribly. Perhaps it was good for the kids to see how being over confident can lead to trouble, LOL. To end the evening, the kids entertained themselves with their own Tic-Tac-Toe tournament. CubJ was victorious.

 

This is a very interesting KOA. They have some sites that are down in a lovely section of large trees beside the river.  Then, they have the new section where the regular Kozy Kabin’s and several tent/motor home sites are just off the highway and below the train tracks. The highlight of this section is that it is beside the brand new, very deluxe washrooms, laundry and outdoor kitchen. The family that runs this KOA has had a stroke of genius and made seven large bathrooms inside of the wash house. Each one has basin sinks on granite countertops, fresh tile floors and large walk in showers! I assure you that these washrooms are nicer than many a mid-range hotel room.

While the many trains (seven to nine each of the three days) that pass by were more than we expected from the listed “occasional train” and the shock of being directly off/below the highway were not our favourite it was overall a good KOA stay. Had I know that we would be in the new few trees, highway brakes of big rigs section at the time of booking, I would have sprung for one of the fancy lodges (they have a kitchen, eating area and washroom in addition to beds) that have a FANTASTIC deck looking over the river. Sadly, we were not able to move into one during our stay despite the staffs efforts, as they were already rented both of our nights.

What really rounded out the Lava Hot Springs KOA was the cleanliness of the whole campground, the friendliness of all of the staff, the involved owners taking the time to greet guests, the fresh new kozy kabin complete with air conditioning and the fantastic shower facilities for cleaning up after a day on the river. So all in all, if you are in Lava Hot Springs, stay at this KOA in the older section and use that outstanding upper washhouse!

Butterfly, that is what our rented four person river tube looked like! We had a fantastic time on the river. One starts out entering the river at a rather calm point at the park. The ride begins with a small section of bumps and gushes leading into some little lulls that pull you along lulling you into a dreamy state.  Then you are off on a small turn where a camp ground over looks you and occasionally some good humoured campers wipe out a garden hose and spray you into a faster section! It was like the real life version of using the water guns on the bumper boat riders at Calaway Park. After that, you start heading into the channels when some of the Hot Spring water floods into the river. This has the advantage of warming up the water further while speeding up your ride. This is where the laughs really begin! After that there are some good gushes of water and slow patches to catch your breath. It is a fantastic ten minute ride DOWN THE RIVER, dunt dunt dun.

After you exit the river, you have a short walk over a few blocks back to the starting point. This proved ideal for our needs as we would only have CubJ in his cast cover for a total of 45 minutes a session. The risk after that is that it can cause vascular damage. Think of this thing a giant vinyl oven mitt that you pry his arm into, then suck the air out of and can immerse him in water for a tonne of fun. With the ten minutes on the water, followed the walk back, we were able to get in six runs in two hours!

Following our first set of six we headed into the official Lava Hot Springs centre. This could be the most lovely hot springs set up I have been to. They have five pools all graduated in temperature. Unlike the Jasper Hot Springs, there are no cold ones. The temperatures range from 110˚f down to 102˚f, in stone pools that are shaded in sections. Some of the pools even have small pebble bottoms that feel fantastic on the feet. This was a great way to spend a few hours relaxing and giving CubJ’s arm a break before heading back to the river.

We then enjoyed two more hours running the river on our tube. The hardest part of the whole thing is negotiating your exit from the river which is NOT a graceful thing! To end our fun day on the water, we headed back to the hot springs to relax. What a FANTASTIC new activity taking tube on the riverin Lava Hot Springs was.

We spent our evening relaxing after a shower, gorging ourselves on dinner, another rousing family game night and a movie on the iPad in bed for the LittleJ’s! SparkJ was once again the winner of our National Park’s Yatzee game and CubJ the winner of the Tic-Tac-Toe tournament. The littleJ’s laid on the big bed and watched Toy Story three laughing together until all the fresh air and river fun had them sawing logs in the little log kozy kabin!

I can honestly say that our time in Lava Hot Springs was fun. I would defiantly recommend spending a day on a tube in the river and soaking in the hot springs to anyone in the area. Thanks for all for the laughs trying out a new activity, the yummy pizza and the fun family game tournament memories.

With the three big legs of our journey over, we would be heading back to Great Falls via the Helena IHOP the following morning.

Our next stop on the Road Trip 2012 was Bear Lake, Utah!

 

Our next stop on the Road Trip 2012 was Bear Lake, Utah!

 

Bear Lake is a natural freshwater lake on the Utah-Idaho border in the Western United States. It is the second largest natural freshwater lake in Utah[1] and has been called the "Caribbean of the Rockies" for its unique turquoise-blue color, the result of suspended limestone deposits in the water.[2] Its water properties have led to the evolution of several unique species that live naturally only within the lake.[3] Bear Lake is over 250,000 years old.[4] It was formed by fault subsidence that continues today, slowly deepening the lake along the eastern side.[5]

Originally named Black Bear Lake by Donald Mackenzie, an explorer for the North West Fur Company who discovered the lake in 1819. The name was later changed to Bear Lake.[6] The lake is a popular destination for tourists and sportsmen and the surrounding valley has gained a reputation for having high quality raspberries.[7]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bear_Lake_(Idaho%E2%80%93Utah)

Bear Lake was an AMAZING find! By the time the guy from Ontario, that grew up on Lake Superior (I hear they do not call it superior for no reason) is grinning from ear to ear like a Daddy in an electronics shop on a free 5k shopping trip, you know it is good. The lake is a spectacular colour, nicely cool/warm and pleasantly long.

For our time in Bear Lake, we stayed at the Bear Lake/Garden City KOA. It is a large KOA kampground with many Kozy Kabins, tonnes of tent sites and even more trailer/motor home sites. They even have one site that has a fenced yard complete with a private hot tub! This KOA is on par with Yellowstone for size and one of the very best for amenities that we have stayed at.

While cooking dinner one evening, we had the opportunity to speak with the Grandmother of the owners. She gave us quite a bit of insight into the ongoing efforts of the family to ensure that this KOA keeps its kampers happy. I can attest that having a full sized (small town) grocery store and an Ace Hardware on the property was not something we had seen before. This was fantastic, as anything that you might possibly need was within a three minute walk from your site. That was in addition to great staff that kept the whole place clean, knew all about the surrounding area and had great recommendations for the best places to visit.

For the LittleJ’s the highlights were that the property has a Jumping Pillow that they made great use of even with a broken arm, a nice swimming pool because hours in the lake might not be enough for a kid, bikes to rent for a family ride and mini golf! Really, this location has it all for kids and adults. When you are not enjoying one of the nicest lakes I have ever had the joy of visiting, you are in a GREAT campground with all of the amenities you could want. For me, this KOA ranks in my top five ever! If you are in the area, with a tent, trailer, motor home or in need of a cabin, we could not recommend this KOA highly enough!

After getting settled into our Kozy Kabin, we were off to the lake to have a picnic dinner on the beach. We enjoyed a relaxing meal of chicken quesadillas and watched the sun set. Following that we were off to try Bear Lake famous shakes.

For our first stop, we went to the Quick N' Tasty. We tried the much talked about Raspberry shake. The shakes are thick, creamy and perfectly flavoured. They do not have that fake edible oil product over flavoured taste that too many shakes have these days.  We could understand why all of the reviews about Bear Lake include some sort of comments about the shakes. We tried the big three places while in town, Quick N' Tasty, La Beaus and Jake’s. I am pleased to report that Jake’s, our last stop on the way out of town had the best shakes of all. La Beaus was the most entertaining to have as we rode one of the four person bikes to get a shake. If you are in Bear Lake, we highly recommend having a shake.  

Both of our days in Bear Lake, we rented a boat from Cisco’s. http://www.ciscoslanding.com/ The first day we took out “Baby” who had a lovely roof to offer come shade in the +35˚C sun and peppy engine. As we got the run down on the workings of the boat the Cisco’s agent mentioned the rules of about swimming off the boat. Imagine our pleasant surprise to learn that they encouraged us to swim off the boat.  So with that knowledge we were off to explore the bright blue lake. After a quick tour of about 10% of the lake we were all in heaven. It was then that I asked SparkJ, the only one who had gotten into her bathing suit before boarding the boat, if we could throw her in the water from the front of the boat!  She looked at me dubiously... I then added that I would flip down the ladder so that she could swim around the boat and climb up the ladder. With that knowledge she was all in for heading into the lake.

 

 

Needless to say, SparkJ greatly enjoyed her time in the water. We were all mot impressed with the bravery that she displayed. CubJ was enjoying dangling his legs off the back of the back of the boat into the surprisingly warm water. Given how pleasant the water was we decided to head back in, all get changed and go swimming in the lake together. While we were back in the dock, DaddyJ came up with the great plan of renting a tube to use while we were swimming.

It was a FANTASTIC plan. We enjoyed two and one half more glorious hours of swimming tubing and jumping in off of the boat. The water was clear, warm and wonderful. It was almost like being in Cayman!  The kids had a wonderful time in the tube laughing their heads off and signalling that they wanted to go faster and faster. It was a very carefree afternoon watching the kids laugh and play.

Upon returning to the KOA, we spent the rest of the day alternating between the pool, jumping pillow, playground and getting shakes on the big bike. As far as camping trips go, it was the best days ever. It was relaxing, filled with laughter and an all around good time.

The following day, we rented another boat and tube. While we had some issues getting Big Mable not to go under in the beginning, we worked it out and enjoyed  three hours of tubing and swimming fun.  With the aid of CubJ’s cast cover, he too enjoyed tubing and swimming. We were all sad to leave Bear Lake that afternoon but excited to head off to our next destination.

Thanks for the great time Bear Lake, Utah, we look forward to returning one day..........

BREAKING NEWS: Surprise Trip to PARIS!!!!!

News flash: DaddyJ takes family on a SURPRISE trip to Paris! Paris twice in six months for the LittleJ’s, once with MommyJ and once with both DaddyJ and MommyJ.....

On the road from Arco, Idaho to our next stop we were pleasantly surprised with a trip to Paris, Paris Idaho that is! We had to stop at the road sign and snap a picture to commemorate the hilarity of this second visit to Paris in six months. The town was lovely, there is a huge and historic Later Day Saint’s site to visit along with a picturesque town center. Just be sure not to blink while driving through this photogenic small American town.

Road Trip 2012: Leg One - Craters of the Moon, Arco, Idaho and EBR1

Our road trip this year started after the summer camp open house late Friday afternoon. We were able to make good time out of the city and arrived in Great Falls by nine that evening. After a quick dinner it was time to hit the Fairfield Inn for a one night stay.

On Saturday we were in for a six hour drive to Arco, ID, which has the distinction of being the first city light by nuclear power.

Near Arco, one can visit EBR1, the world’s first electricity producing breeder reactor. While this is of note, the real reason for our visit to the Arco area, was to see the Crater’s of the Moon National Monument.

Between 15,000 and 2,000 years ago, the Craters of the Moon Lava Field formed during eight major eruptive periods. During this time the Craters of the Moon lava field grew to cover 618 square miles. The Wapi and Kings Bowl lava fields formed contemporaneously about 2,200 years ago. ~ http://www.nps.gov/crmo/naturescience/geologicactivity.htm

I can honestly say that our visit to Crater’s of the Moon National Monument greatly exceeded my expectations. As you are driving towards the monument, you pass through flat plains of dry prairie that suddenly turn into this other worldly mass of grey, black and reddish brown. At first, you blink your eyes a few times and wonder if the heat waves rising off the plus 35˚C parched land are playing tricks on your eyes. Really, it is like seeing a reverse mirage where there is not an ocean of water but undulating black lava! It is truly a sight to behold.

I can not imagine what the Mormon settlers who were following Goodale’s Cutoff on that portion of the Oregon Trail were thinking when saw that black lava for as far as the eye can see. Considering the landscape reminded all of us of “Hell, Grand Cayman Island” they must have felt like Moses in the desert!

We did the seven mile loop of the monument where we took several small hikes. We were able to see the youngest of the lava flows and some of the monoliths. I found it quite interesting to learn that many of these monoliths were rafted here by the lava flows and that the others were formed by bits of splatter cone sides ripping off like a clay vase on a potter’s wheel when it becomes lopsided!

This site gives visitors a chance to think through their impact on the world around us. In the Devil’s Orchard, we learned about how Witches Broom (Mistle Toe) twists and snarls the branches into twisted masses. Ironically, this is part of a natural relationship between to living plants that leaves these trees looking quite different from our usual expectations of what a tree should look like. At one point in the history of the monument, a head ranger had decided that these trees should be cut down because they were unsightly. It was a very good opportunity for all of us to question how we react to and what we think about things that are different. Without this great information about why the trees were so twisted and the chance to really think about what we preceive beauty to be, we might have dismissed these trees as just being what happens when you grow through lava!

We hiked up the steep Inferno Cone where we were rewarded with a breath taking view of this other worldly location. As we looked around at the sea of black lava, I could understand why some of the Apollo space missions had trained here for their time on the moon. 

After that we were off see the Splatter cones which were both larger and deeper than I imagined.

Our most interesting stop on the loop was exploring the Lava Tubes! We toured through Indian Tunnel  lava tube which was nice and cool as compared to scotching hot heat above ground. It was surprising how large the lava tubes. CubJ did a great job of negotiating the rocky terrain and climbing over some of the lava boulders despite his cast.

We highly recommend visiting this amazing National Monument! Craters of the Moon, receives eight thumbs up from the 4J’s!  

After our busy day of exploring these other worldly sights, we stopped at the local cafe, “The Pickle Place”, home of the atomic burger. I love eating at little cafes where you can sit at the counter, half the menu is deep fried and you know that it is all good food. The Pickle Place did not disappoint. I ate the best deep fried pickles that were crunchy with a light batter that rendered them more like dill pickle chips than those greasy pickle wedges that you usually get served. The Atomic Burgers were tasty and the pie was outstanding!

We stayed at the Arco/Craters of the Moon KOA in KK1!

This was a lovely little campground run by a very nice family. Each evening, they showed the London Olympics via projector in the air conditioned shop and they offered yummy ice cream for only one dollar a scoop! The kids really enjoyed riding the little bikes that they rent at the office all over the campground like banshees.

Our fire pit and picnic table behind our cabin were well used each evening as we relaxed. We watched the kids enjoy the bikes, read around the fire and watched the stars appear by the thousands. If you are going to visit Craters of the Moon, we highly recommend this quiet little KOA.

EBR1, this was the world first breeder reactor. This nuclear reactor was built in 1949 to test the principal of nuclear physics theory that additional fuel was being produced during fission. A by-product of this nuclear reactor was the ability to both use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes and to power the nearby town of Arco’s street lamps. Considering that this was post WWII, showing people that nuclear energy could be positively was very important.

This was an incredibly interesting place to tour. I learned a great deal about nuclear power and it greatly improved my opinion of its use. In light of the accidents that there have been in my lifetime, Chernobyl this past year in Japan, I must say it always seemed far riskier than it actually is. Knowing the awesomely destructive power that nuclear reactions can have when used in times of war, it is not something that I have on the positive side of the tally sheet normally.

It was amusing to see how slack security was in the 1950's. There was one security guard in charge of protecting the nuclear rods in the evenings which was a stark contrast to the current security at the other nuclear sites in the surrounding area. We noted several high security areas complete with serious gate security as we made large 90˚ turns in the middle of nowhere to give great privacy to testing areas. Hilariously, this was all prior to finding out that some the sites still being used in the Idaho National Laboratory  area require that their employees are bussed in and out of the site! I am not normally a big conspiracy theory person but all of this security, bussing people in and silo domes are enough to make anyone feel like something “else” is going on. LOL

A great deal of this facility seemed pretty rudimentary. The best example of this was the SCRAM button which would immediately shut down EBR1 in case of a meltdown. At the other end of SCRAM button was scientist standing with an AXE. His job was to chop the cord that would drop the nuclear rod into a hole thereby stopping the reaction instantly! Can you imagine selling that as your fail safe in today’s world, a man with an axe! It sounds like a bad horror movie far more than it does a serious scientific facility. I am glad safety protocols have improved over the years.

I think that the littleJs learned some interesting things while they were touring EBR1 and that they will remember visiting this site for years to come. While I was excited to visit this historic location, I can say that it too exceeded my expectations for both interest value and educational content. As our final stop in the Arco area, I can honestly say that this was a fantastic place to visit on a road trip! Where else can you visit lava fields, climb through lava tubes, feel like you’re driving around an “Area 51” testing site, learn about nuclear fission and see old ICB silos being used for storing tractors?