I'm visiting friends from graduate school this week. Our location? East Idaho, home of Sun Valley, Ketchum, and Hailey. For the past 27 years, Hailey and Ketchum have been hosting The Trailing of the Sheep Festival, which ends with the herding of hundreds of sheep down the main street of Hailey. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
AFter a 160 mile drive from Boise, we arrived in Hailey feeling a little peckish and in need of nourishment. After an outstanding Thai lunch, we were ready to explore Hailey, birthplace of the poet Ezra Pound, residence of Ernest Hemingway, and former home of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore.
Our first stop was the Blaine County Historical Museum which has been preserving local history since 1964.
Here I learned more about mining,the first switchboard in Idaho, the aforementioned Ezra Pound (proud to be have been born in Idaho, but spent most of his adult life in Europe), and the buffalo horn chair you see above. This buffalo horn chair was made by James Kinney as he came across the plains from Indiana to Idaho in 1868. It's not something you see everyday.
Later that night we attended a Farm to Table dinner held in a suprisingly luxurious humane society building, nestled in a valley between arid foothills. All the food was locally sourced and delicious. The main entree? Lamb. The lamb was raised nearby at the Peavey ranch, which has been in operation for five generations. We sat across from the director of the festival, and matriarch Diane Peavey came by personally to greet us. On our other side was a family with "just a few sheep." How many sheep, my friend Leslie inquired. "Oh, just thirty ewes."
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