Juniper Park, Ririe, ID - Aug 2006

We left Fremont Lake and were heading in the direction of Oregon, but needed to stop in a town large enough for some shopping at stores other than Walmart. We also needed to linger long enough to get our mail and prescriptions sent to us as well as order some supplies online. My research led us to a very nice little county campground called Juniper Park. It was on the Ririe Reservoir and located about 20 miles east of Idaho Falls, Idaho.

While the campground was perched on a cliff overlooking the reservoir, only a couple of the campsites actually had views of the lake. The other sites were scattered about -- some back-ins and some pull-thrus. The park had lots and lots of very large junipers (hence the name) and the campsites were nicely spaced amongst the very tall shrubs to allow plenty of privacy and elbow room. Most of the sites had full hookups and all had paved pads that were fairly level. The lush, green grass throughout the park was a delight for us and the dogs. The downside to having lush green grass in the middle of an August heatwave was -- sprinklers, lots and lots of sprinklers -- sometimes going off twice a day for an hour at a time. We had four Rain Birds on our site alone, but with a little fiddling, I was able to direct the jet spray away from the RV, otherwise we would have heard an hours worth of "splat, splat, splat" twice daily.

We spent two weeks here and on both weekends, the park was filled to capacity. There were lots of boaters at the park and lots of water skiers and fishermen. Even though the daytime temps were hot, the water temperature was still very chilly. It didn't stop the skiers and swimmers though. Early one morning, on our walk across the dam, we saw this skier making great patterns in the very calm water.

Sunsets were lovely at the park. There was a nice walking path around one small section of the lake and the views were delightful. From this overlook, the twinkling lights of Idaho Falls could be seen.