Spring Blossoms in Boise

Sunday, May 11, 2014--Boise, Idaho

It's springtime in Boise.  Trees are blooming--lilac, fruit, chestnut, etc.  And blossoms are also on decorative plants everywhere.  Known as Tree City, the streets are lined with lots of large trees of various kinds, so seeing them in bloom is especially nice.  We've driven up and down streets in the older neighborhoods seeing beautifully restored houses with lawns full of blossoming trees and other plants.

We started the day with a visit to the Idaho State Capitol Building.  It's a very nice building in traditional design with a dome.  It is bright with lots of marble and many skylights.  As I have experienced when visiting other capitol buildings on Sundays, it was totally vacant except for tourists.  We didn't see a single guard or employee.  Of course, there is video surveillance throughout the building.  We could not tell whether it was being monitored by an unseen guard or not, but I'm sure it was recording everything that was happening.

We walked through much of the downtown area when we left the capitol.  We saw the Egyptian Theater, the Bosque Center and the block of Bosque businesses around it, the architecture of the old buildings that remain downtown along with the more modern buildings.  Boise has a downtown that is alive.  Much of that is due to the students living on the campus of Boise State University which is just a few blocks away.

We drove to the Julia Davis Park which is home of several museums, the zoo, and gardens.  One side of it is the Boise River, a fast-moving, clear stream that has trout in it.  The day was so nice that we just explored outside rather than go inside any of the museums.  We walked along a path beside the river, we crossed a bridge which took us to the Boise State University campus, we walked through the campus, then we returned to the park where we watched a performance of Marimba Boise, a local group performing African music on their homemade marimbas.  They wore tie-died t-shirts.  And to the side, a group of dancers in African attire waiting to perform themselves danced in a circle to the beat of the music.  A man with a white cockatoo and a parrot entertained the children to the rear of the crowd which sat on the grass in the warm sunshine enjoying it all.  It reminded me of the Summer of Love in San Francisco--1967 at the height of the hippie movement.

In the late afternoon, we ate pizza for an early dinner.  Then we drove to Bogus Basin, the ski area in the mountains above Boise.  It was a beautiful drive lined with some very nice homes sitting on top of hills overlooking the city--the most impressive being the house of Mr. Simplot, a potato magnate whose name is encountered everywhere here in Idaho.  Not only was his house nice, but the entire hill it sits on is covered in grass which is regularly mowed.  The ski basin was not so impressive.  It is small, has only a couple of small lodges for eating or drinking, and has only chair lifts which go to the tops of gently sloping hills.  However, I'm sure people here in Boise are very happy to have a place to ski that is so close to their home and is probably quite inexpensive.

By that time, the day was over and we were tired.  We returned to the room where we planned our route for tomorrow and I watched the latest episode of Mr. Selfridge on Masterpiece Theater.