Some favorite places

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Last week I commented on my least favorite place, the entire state of Texas.

This week I am commenting about the Hagerman area, a small town with under 1,000 population. The interesting part includes the area within five miles of the town.

I first was drawn to Hagerman when I was a college student back in 1956. I had heard about the fossil beds, and a couple of friends and I drove east from Boise some 100 miles. The fossil beds are in a gravel-packed hill above the Snake River.

At the time there were no restrictions on digging in the area. So we dug. The fossil beds are famous for the fossils of the Hagerman horse from some 50,000 years ago. Some experts date the fossil remains to over a million years.

Luckily, the federal government has taken over the site, to preserve it.

In our digging, we uncovered part of a horse skeleton.

Our dig took us under an overhang with one person holding on to our ankles to retrieve us in case the overhang collapsed.

We returned to the site on a couple of occasions. Since then, I have talked with officials about our discoveries. We were not the first, nor the last, do so.

Not anymore. The site is locked down. They give tours, and the headquarters building is filled with displays and information of the area. Years later, while on a visit to Toronto, Canada, to my surprise, a full skeleton of the Hagerman Horse was on display.

Just a couple of miles east of town, the hillsides are covered by the Thousand Springs. Large pools of crystal-clear water are great to explore. The water flows over the hillside into these pools. The water eventually ends up in the Snake River. I have fished these pools and you can look down 20 to 25 feet and see fish swimming around. It’s tough fishing because it is difficult to get where the fish can’t see you. There’s some nice fish there if you are patient.

The springs come from an underground river that finds its way from some 50 miles north, gushing through lava rock to the Hagerman area.

On the other side of town, you can take an unpaved road and see a Frank Lloyd Wright house sitting on a hill above the Snake River. The house was vacant for a number of years. It is the only Wright project in Idaho. We would go by the house to visit the Snake River Pottery studio. I’ve had a number of pieces. The artist I knew at the time I am certain has passed on by now.

It has been one of my favorite places for years.