Boise 2010, Part 2

Saturday was graduation day. We awoke a little earlier than any of us probably would've liked, considering it was a vacation for most of us, but that gave us all plenty of time to get ready for the fun adventures that the morning would hold. Val and her dad left the earliest of us all, but soon all of us "kids" were ready, and Val's brother, Steve, was appointed as chauffeur and the first half of our large group of people headed for Boise State. This, of course, turned into quite the adventure, as we weren't 100% sure where we were heading (Steve had never driven in Boise before, and none of the rest of us were 100% sure where we needed to be on the 4-5 lane freeway). A little too late we realized that we should've taken a different turn-off, so we ended up making some phone calls and taking a slightly different route. But we made it, finally, and really no worse for wear, and headed for the Taco Bell Arena where we met up with Val's dad. Eventually we found enough seats for 12 of us, the rest of our group met up with us, and the graduation began. I have to give the President of BSU credit for giving an interesting graduation speech. In my experience, graduation speeches are notoriously boring, but this guy actually made it interesting and threw in some humor. Bonus points for him!

After the graduation we took some pictures and then headed in separate directions. Us "kids" headed to lunch (for most of us that consisted of Baja Fresh - yummy!) and then we went to downtown Boise to the Idaho State Capitol. Last time I was in Boise, 2 years ago, the Capitol was closed for renovations. So I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was open this time. And wow! I was totally unprepared for how amazing it was inside. I'd never been in a capitol building before so I really didn't know what to expect. Honestly, I figured you could walk in the door, look at the lobby and that was it. No way! We got to explore the entire building! All four floors! We saw the Senate and House chambers (very cool!), more marble staircases and pillars than I could count, offices belonging to people whose names I have heard for various reasons, and did I mention the marble? Marble everywhere. So awesome. After touring to our hearts' content, we took some pictures on the Capitol steps. On the way home we stopped at Marshall's (something we don't have in Cd'A) and then we stopped at a lollipop store which turned out to just be an ordinary candy store. I didn't buy anything - aren't you proud of me? :)

Saturday night found us feasting upon grilled steelhead (a relative of the salmon, they tell me), and enjoying a dessert of chocolate orange cake. We also played some crazy games! I don't know if any of you have seen "Minute to Win It" (I've only watched it a time or two) but I am pretty sure some of the crazy games we played were from that show! We had to be the first team to pull all the tissues out of a tissue box, the first person to get 3 marbles from point A to point B with our toes, etc. Everyone was laughing pretty hard pretty much the entire time. :)

Saturday night also found us watching a Bollywood movie, and this only bears mention since I decided that I do not like Bollywood. I'm just sayin. . .it's just not my cup of tea. For those of you who don't know what Bollywood is, it is Indian film. Indian, as in, people from India. The name is a play on "Hollywood." They have made their own style of movies with crazy dances and songs, and they are in Indian so you have to read the subtitles, they are about 3 hours long, and, yeah. . .not my style. Everyone else seemed entertained, though. 

Sunday found us getting a little extra sleep and then watching another Bollywood movie. Well, I think I stayed upstairs for the first half of the movie, playing games on my iPod, and then I watched a little bit of the Bollywood movie but was rather confused and confirmed that I don't care for that genre. 

Sunday afternoon we went to the mall and walked around for a few hours, admiring (expensive) dresses and gagging at some of the current styles. :) I happen to like walking around "normal" malls, especially since the one in Cd'A (and the ones in Spokane, really) are quite pitiful. Our mall here in town is a whopping 1-level. . .with about 10 stores. And only about 3 of those are worth going in. So the "real" mall in Boise was great fun.

After the mall, we headed "home" and ate a delicious dinner of Elk steaks (I told you we ate good!) and packed to go home. We played cards for a little bit and talked a bit, too, and then fell asleep, knowing full well we would have to wake up bright and way-too-early for our long drive home.

Monday was our day to return home. The alarm went off far too early and after a quick breakfast of GoGurt, we were on the road, bright eyed and bushy tailed, by 7:15am, Boise (Mountain) time. We occupied ourselves with music (I took my iPod, and the cassette adaptor didn't cooperate as much as we wanted it to, but it did work okay), and games. 

After several hours on the road we made it to Craters of the Moon National Monument. We purposely took the long road home so we could go to Craters of the Moon, and I'm glad we did. We got to do some hiking and exploring, even got to walk through a cave. It was pretty cool (the cave was literally cool!).

After lunch and a few more hours on the road we stopped to look at Borah Peak, Idaho's high point, where I took a picture for my dad (he really wanted one). We drove some more and stopped by the Salmon River and then soon passed through the city (town?) of Salmon and before long were into the great state of Montana. I decided the prairie of Montana would be a beautiful place to live, although perhaps a bit lonely at times. We hit a lot of rain in Montana, but it had basically stopped by the time we got to Taco Bell in Hamilton for dinner. I was a bit disappointed we didn't end up stopping at Cracker Barrel in Missoula, like several of us hoped to do, but that's okay. Eventually we made it back into Idaho, and finally got home around 10:30pm, Cd'A (Pacific) time. Total time for travel/stops? 15-1/2 hours. Yep, it was a long day.

But was it worth it? Totally. And would I do it again? You bet. And do I want to go back to Boise? Oh yes.

It was a great, fun trip! Hope you enjoyed the armchair version!