Boise… not just potatoes!

The Best Kept Secret of the West (shhh)

Boise was such a fantastic surprise for us – we just loved the little city in the hills that we used to only associate with potatoes!  We camped at an RV park just outside town on the Greenbelt- an awesome paved biking trail that goes right through Boise along the river north/south about 25 miles.  We jumped on the Greenbelt and got a biking tour of the city, heading 12 miles through the city, passing fun restaurants, bars, and wineries along the scenic river.  It even connected us to mountain bike trails south of the city in the nearby foothills. 

Boise Mountain Biking

We rode the Homestead to Highland Valley trail loop, which was a wider doubletrack trail up the mountain (similar to a lot of rides we’ve done out West).  We climbed ~1000 feet in a couple miles, but were rewarded at the top with some great views of the Boise area.  From there, we took the Cobb Valley trail down which was loose, sandy singletrack, fun and flowy but technical because of the sand/gravel and difficult to stop in places.

We took a different Greenbelt trail (so many trails, and bike lanes on most roads!) back into town, and stopped at Boise Brewery, one of a few different breweries in town.  The bartenders were friendly, offering us suggestions of other things to check out in the area and enjoyed a beer before biking back to make dinner.

Nightlife

We headed out to check out the city’s nightlife one evening as well.  Unfortunately it was a Tuesday so it wasn’t bumping, but we found a couple good cocktail bars, and Penguilly’s which had live music and dancing. Afterwards, we even found a corner hotdog vendor who had veggie dogs!

Boise is such a cute city, and VERY bikeable!  We passed at least 5 large parks, and tons of families out on bikes.  It seems like a very safe city too, we are adding it to the list of places we would live someday!