Ok, up kinda early, and buy breakfast at the KoA, so we don’t have the hassle of making it or cleaning up. Sounds like a good idea … but I’m kinda miffed. They charge you $7.50 for this, and most of it is fine – two large pancakes that do taste very good, THREE slices of bacon, thick cut, also very good … but when we get to the scrambled eggs … ok, are eggs REALLY so expensive that they have to dole out only a tablespoon? I’d think the eggs were the cheapest part of this meal, so come on, give me TWO tablespoons!

These guys have almost totally soured me on KoA, especially with the WiFi thing. Yeah, THAT thing – WiFi that DOES NOT WORK. I thought it was only crashing when I tried to upload photos, but The Bear tells me it dumped her twice when she – get this! – was trying to make reservations on the KoA site! They don’t even want you to give them your money! Idiots. FIX IT! I bitched, and they say “they’re working on it”. Yeah. Sure.

And another thing – the toilet paper here … I thought Gossamer wings were thin. They’re two-by-fours compared to this stuff! Argh! You know, if they made a commercial for it, they should use a song by the Doors for it – “Break on Through (To the Other Side)”. Thank god we leave today.

Anyway, we get packed up and loaded, and off we go … in the wrong direction. It’s ok! We’re actually doing it on purpose! We want to go back by the ranger station to get some maps – surely the lady with the key to the map cabinet is in today (she wasn’t on Friday when we last stopped by). No. She’s not. But the ones who were there were glad to see us, and glad to hear our tales of woe from the ride yesterday … or maybe just glad to see we had not been eaten by bears … piles of paperwork if that happens, you know. And then they have to give the bear an enema, and THAT is hard work! They don’t seem to like you messing around back there …

Anyway, they tell us there’s a ranger station “just the other side of the border with Idaho, maybe 20 minutes away”. Yeah … no. Ok, it was only like 30 minutes, but we kept worrying we’d missed it. Stopped for a map, and got the really sad news – fires in Idaho. Lots of fires in Idaho, and mostly where we want to ride. Really? The rain didn’t stop us, so now you try fire? REALLY?

Yes, each of those orange dots is a fire – ten in Idaho, three in Montana. Well, our first stop is in Arco, about a third of the way in from the right side of the state, about as far up from the bottom as it is from the right, so no fires there, but not much riding either … it’s all a good 50 or more miles away, either towards the fire, or towards bear country. I thought we were done with the bears for a while, but I guess not! Grrrr.

Ok, so we drive on, and see this:

Can you see the mountains in the distance? OF COURSE YOU CAN’T! THEY’RE COVERED IN SMOKE! Really? I could cry.

But I don’t – we go on into Arco and check out this booming metropolis. One square mile of town, but it’s famous! Here is why:

Seems no matter where you go, some jackass has to put graffiti on it. There’s also a submarine conning tower here with a torpedo next to it, maybe tomorrow we’ll find out why. Lunch is a burger (an Atomic Burger!), and dinner is sandwiches. Tomorrow? Craters of the Moon!