As usual, peripatetic travelers Jim and Peggy Mueller are on the road again, this time in the wild raw beauty of the American West. Since this intersects with some of my travels back in the day, and a stalled Hemingway manuscript that I have been working on these last few decades, this account electrified me. The book was not going to be about literature, but rather about the places that the Nobel Laureate for Literature hung out and drank. So far I have managed to slosh down a few drinks in places like Petoskey, MI, (Park Grill) Walloon Lake, MI (Horton bay General Store), Paris, France (the George V Hotel bar), and of course Key West (Sloppy Joe’s, CAPT Tony’s and the Green Parrot).To complete the menu, I will need to travel to Spain and Cuba, damn the bad luck, and of course, Ketchum, Idaho, where his brawling, blustering career ended.

i wonder what Ernie would have thought if he heard Bob Dylan had won the same literary prize that he did?

The memories are powerful. Whether it was my brother’s wedding atop the mountain at Jackson Hole, or days ski-bumming in Utah to the south, these images are the essence of life in the vast beauty of Idaho and Wyoming. I envy the way the Muellers live and travel. But let us hear Jim tell it himself:

… it was the third stop on our fall 2016 ‘Week in the West’ tour ….. which after arriving in Salt Lake, started last week with a couple of days at Park City ( site of the 2002 Winter Olympics..) …..

…then on up to Jackson Hole for the main event, a long weekend with son Tony and family at their new place.

We had brisk fall weather… and generally sunny days… colorful aspens and some awesome mountain views, especially of the very grand Tetons……. 12-13k’…

but the highlight of course was our time with the grand-daughters…. and Georgina’s birthday celebration.

On Sunday they all headed back to LA for work and school – and we head out toward Sun Valley – a first.

The drive west, partly along the old Oregon Trail gives you a new appreciation for the efforts of the pioneers……

After the Teton Pass…. there’s a lot of open, blank country……. but it offered up a couple of surprises….. like .. a huge, huge lava field….! some 150 sq miles Tripper…. in rural, rural Idaho……. dating way back

and further on ….. you can imagine the surprise in approaching Arco (ID, pop. 995) to spot…..

the sail of ex-USS Hawkbill (SSN-666)….. in the middle of essentially nowhere……. the short story is that the Navy worked on its’ first prototype sub reactors in the early 50s here at the nearby Naval Reactor Facility … and provided electric power to the area for a bit….. so they called it “Atomic City”

…. more recently, some Naval Reserve folks thought a memorial was in order …… OK..?

Then it was on to Ketchum and with some daylight left – time for a sunset drink at the old (1936) Sun Valley Lodge…….

Averell Harriman had the idea to promote more travel on his Union Pacific and developed the country’s first destination ski resort here ….. and first ski lifts… built by his railroad engineers…..

It’s hosted thousands of famous visitors over the decades …… but during WW-II it, like Yosemite and other places…. functioned as a U.S. Naval rehabilitation hospital for causalities from the Pacific……..

Maybe its’ most notable guest was famed author Ernest Hemingway who stayed there in 1939

to work on his epic Spanish Civil War novel, For Whom the Bell Tolls……..

with wife Mary during a 1947 visit…..

He would then return to Key West and a long stay in Cuba…..interrupted by WW-II, Ernest reported from China and Europe and in between ran ASW ops in the Caribbean from his fishing boat Pilar…

After years living in Paris, Madrid, Key West and Cuba….. Hemingway returned to Ketchum in 1959 – after the Castro takeover – to hunt, fish… and to contemplate…. they say he was physically ill, mentally depressed and unproductive as a writer….

and it was here in July of 1961 – just back from Mayo, that Ernest…. like his father … would commit suicide…….

with the infamous W & C Scott 12 ga double-barrel……… earlier in Kenya….

He is buried in the Ketchum city cemetery in a rather plain setting…… with his 4th wife Mary next to him.

nearby… is a Hemingway Memorial in a nicely wooded area of aspens…..

An interesting fall jaunt……..some great scenery, nice family time …. and a closed chapter on Hemingway……..

http://papasplanet.com/2010/09/09/hemingways-ketchum/

Jim

BTW …. we just missed… by hours… their annual “Trailing of the Sheep” festival in Ketchum… ……

a yearly run of abt. 2,000 sheep from the upper reaches of Sun Valley down through Ketchum and on to bottom land south in Hailey……. they’ve turned this ranching effort into an area festival, which includes….. shearing, spinning and weaving wool; the “trailing” and Basque dancing … and of course lamb chop dinner specials….

It’s a neat little town……

Editor’s Note: That comes as something of an understatement. This is a trip I would like to take, and soon!

-Vic

Copyright 2016 Jim Mueller
www.vicsocotra.com