McCall 2020: Head Waves

In July we made a trek back to Idaho for the summer. Summer of 2020 was supposed to be in Italy. In December 2019 I was reading the reports coming through The Guardian about a new virus in Wuhan. I was one of the people who was getting more and more worried as the number of articles being published increase as we moved closer and closer to New Years. On New Years we decided to kill the trip to Italy, between Clem and I the reason was because we decided to stop shopping for house. Mainly because we were find ourselves looking for house well over 2.5M in a very limited areas of interest. For me, secretly I was worried the coronavirus spreading outside of China. By January that was now reality. 

In January we instead decided to shift our summer plans so the kids would be at camp in the early part of the summer and then head to Payette Lake and spend summer with Clem’s family up there. The trip eventually became pilgrimage to celebrate his mother’s “Double 40th” up in McCall, ID. As the epidemic became worse and worse, we were pretty stead fast on going to up there. In April, when the rumors of kids summer camps being shuttered for the summer to help stop the spread of COVID. We realized McCall had remain and we needed to offset with another trip.

As McCall remained on our summer docket, travel to Idaho was the next red flag. We decided we were going to rent a car and just moto it north to the Spud State. Initially we were shooting for two weeks but instead settled on just one and snagged a week out in Aptos to give us ocean time. From April to July, seeing the Covid number rise and rise, was scary, it’s still scary. When started to write this post, California is nowasw seeing over 300 new positive results a day. Now that trump’s white house has muzzled the CDC for good. All counties and states are now showing extremely lower numbers but are marking these new low numbers as “additional results will likely increase” once states and counties get their hand on real data. And not something the white house has cooked up.

Officially, the road trip to McCall was the longest road trip the kids have ever taken and possibly Clem’s longest road trip. We opted for midnight run for the border. We all got up at 12:30AM and hit the road. I took the first leg, making it to  south of Donner  in about 3 hours. Smooth sailiing was an understatement. It literally was just us and all the truckers. We went for the least scenic root of Nevada, Oregon and Idaho because it was the quicker root. 

The drive went by pretty fast. We were trying our best to reduce our exposure as much as possible. We bought these toilet covers that literally drape over the whole toilet. We actually only made two stops on the road between home Boise. The rest stop was somewhat clean and the Shell station north of Winnemucca. I had packed a small whole food bag, designed for wine, I think! that had Lysol spray, hand sanitizer, toiled paper, seat covers and a roll of paper towels. Yes, I am drinking the COVID KOOL-AID. If you are shaking your head saying this is overkill. If you are on facebook, please visit a group called Survivor Corps. Then come back at with me I am over-reacting. 

The house we rented filled our needs perfectly. We had Clem’s aunt & uncle staying with us, so we had plenty of beds and right on the water. Payette Lake in McCall is truly a special place. My first visit to McCall was back in 2010 during a snow storm but driving by the lake, which had not frozen over yet, I could tell it amazing. The best part of our house was not just having a dock for our boat rental but our own little beach and protect swim area for the kids to spend hours playing and jumping off the dock. The hot tub is always a plus for Papa and the kids, sadly this house had issues with kids in hot tubs. We didn’t need it really. 

Once in McCall we tried to keep to our house or Clem’s aunt and uncles house. I played the role of sacrificial lamb going out to the grocery store. Overall most locals and tourists were wearing their masks. There was the occasional couple or person not wearing their masks. Always white and the majority were 40+. We managed to do hike, which I will admit, I threw a ridiculous hissy fit, because the plan was changed and then I smashed my toe in to a rock. No I didn’t break my toe, but yet I was a drama queen. Apologies followed. We did manage to get up to Brundage Mountain using the ski lifts to enjoy the views. 

Most of our time was spent on the lake. Papa fell in love with the speed boat and the kids fell in love with tubing. Lochlan even got his hands on the steering wheel once afternoon. A huge highlight of the trip. Now I am not going to leave out our annual trip to partake yumminess of My Father’s Place. We love the shakes at this restaurant and cousin Cathy recommended the Elk burger this time, and it was awesome. So if you are ever in McCall, hit My Father’s Place for burger, shakes and more. I promise when we are back next summer, we will try the Acai bowls!