From our stay at Mike Harris Creek in Idaho, we drove west to Arco, Idaho to stay near Craters of the Moon National National Monument & Reserve. As we approached Arco we passed by a nuclear testing facility in an extremely remote area. Upon arriving to Arco it was well advertised that Arco was the first city lighted by nuclear power. In Arco we stayed down the street from Pickle’s Place, which is a dive known for the Atomic Burger where our waitress had the word “Stupid” tattooed on her forehead and a local patron adorned cowboy hat and open carry 45 caliber pistol. The restaurant looked up to a mountain covered in human-size painted numerals representing high school graduating classes from the early 1920s.
This was our first time ever staying at a private campground and given our string of campsites leading up to this point in our trip it was welcome. It was nice having electricity and water hookups as well as showers and wifi. It had been 5 days since we showered, so…you might imagine. We didn’t have time to use the playground and pool, but caught some amazing sunset views. And the campsite is just a few miles from Craters.
Due to a large earthquake in spring and tremors since then, the caverns at Craters of the Moon was closed for fear they will collapse. That did not prevent us from finding several hours worth of hiking trails and one to the summit of Big Cinder Butte. Fortunately, the kids didn’t realize the name of this totally barren pumice mountain or else I suspect we’d hear it for days on end. The views from the blistering windy summit are worth the hike that can be done in tennis shoes. We could have spent a lot more time here hiking trails and we didn’t realize the enormity of the preserve until leaving for Oregon the next day. The rock in the park varies greatly from dense heavy to brittle airy light and from dark black to burgundy red, although most was dense black. We learned the astronauts in preparing to land on the moon used the area to practice collecting samples.
Shana is a canned ham vintage travel trailer. She carried Bennett Burgess, Cannon Burgess, Kimber Burgess, Matt Burgess, Ruby Burgess, Teagan Burgess over 140 miles through 1 state to Craters of the Moon National Monument pulled by a 2006 Toyota Sequoia to camp near Arco, Idaho. On this RV glamping trip 6 admirers complimented our restored retro red 1958 Shasta Airflyte Deluxe travel trailer. She spent 1 nights at campsite #E1 in Idaho with temperatures ranging from 52℉-86℉ arriving Wednesday, June 24, 2020 and leaving Thursday, June 25, 2020. For more information about this glamping camping destination at Craters of the Moon National Monument in Idaho go to https://www.nps.gov/crmo/index.htm.
