A Little Piece of the Garden of Eden and A Deer Haven

What an unexpected gem!  At the end of our drive on Tuesday, we stayed 2 days at a small campground in Salmon, Idaho, we found on the internet.  What a little piece of Eden this place is!  The Healdshaven campground is right off HWY 93.  The entrance to the campground is indicated by a weatherworn sign and is a gravel road that curves around and passes between two ranches for a short distance.  Even the cows were up against a corner of the fence to greet us!  Unless you follow the road to the end, where it dips down the small hill, you would never know the campground was there.  We were greeted by a sweet little frail looking elderly woman, who must have been in her 80s.   She is the owner and still runs the campground after her husband passed away a few years ago.  Even in the picture below, the road looks like it ends at the mountains, and the ranches are nestled in the small valley beneath them.   

 

We are pleasantly greeted by a beautiful little campground with maybe a dozen sites under shade trees.  We had the whole place to ourselves the rest of the day until almost dark when only a couple RVs showed up for the night. 

Then as you step out from under the trees you behold the beauty surrounding this small campground.  Tucked beneath a colorful rocky mountain, white clouds against a dark blue sky, the Salmon River flowing by, and deer grazing nearby-priceless!!  It couldn’t have gotten any better than that!   You could even boondock on the grassy area below the hookup sites if you wanted to be closer to the river.  It was just so peaceful and serene.  We walked down by the river and then I would linger even longer just soaking in that serenity.  This is definitely one of the most memorable places where we have camped.  Pictures really cannot show the scale and what a beautiful spot this is.  I even watched an eagle soar along the riverbank.

 

  

Then there were the deer!  Oh, my, I was in deer heaven!  There must have been at least 25 does and fawns, some still with their white spots, that roamed all through the campground from noon until dark each day.  When the deer were out, so was I!  I must have taken over a hundred pictures of them.  

  

It is hard to decide which ones to post!  The deer would let me get pretty close to them, so with the camera zoom, I was able to get some nice close up shots.  I had such fun since I love wildlife.   Such pretty gentle creatures. 

      

I especially love the pictures I shot of the mother doe lovingly nuzzling her fawn.  Aw….that was so sweet! 

 

It seemed like half the herd were fawns.  I have never seen so many together at one time.  What a treat!

    

Alright, enough deer pictures!  We were sorry to leave this wonderful place.  If ever heading north through the area again, we will certainly make it a point to stay at this campground again.   But one last cute picture.  What is she saying to me?  “Oh, for  goodness sake, take that camera away from that crazy lady!!”