The Ashley Inn, where we stayed. It was like being hit over the head with a sock filled with tiny, rose-covered Victorian pennies. However, the room was enormous, you could have a pint of Haagen-Daaz delivered to your room for $5, and they had fresh-baked cookies and cold milk available each night for free.

(English toffee Haagen-Daaz and homemade white chocolate macadamia nut cookies make an unspeakably good dessert.)

Friday evening’s dinner — prior to the wonderful dessert, naturally — was in the town of McCall, which lies about thirty minutes north of the inn. Despite their prominent place in this image, I was not trying to capture the family standing next to the red pickup. They did seem very confused as to why I was taking their picture.

The lakeside view off the balcony at the Chinese place. (Panda on the Lake, if you ever happen to be in the neighborhood.) This is what we watched as we ate absolutely divine cashew shrimp and chicken fried rice. Sadly absent are the electric guitar-strumming sounds of a teenage boy about two balconies down who desperately, desperately wanted to impress the girls wandering his direction.

The next morning was spent touring homes at Tamarack Resort. (Neat place, check out the website.) This is the view off the balcony of the first home we visited. Nice enough, especially as you can see the Alpine-style village off to the left, but you don’t get the full effect of what it was really like until…

…I zoom in and take another picture that doesn’t feature the land still under building and landscaping development.

We started noticing a lot of butterflies in McCall. A lot of butterflies. When we got to Tamarack, the numbers increased dramatically over even that. It turns out they fly up from California every few years. Tens of thousands of butterflies were estimated to be in the resort boundaries. (This one doesn’t have a larger version of the picture.)

They were actually quite pretty, as you can see here. (No larger version of this one, either.)

And they truly were everywhere. Imagine this sight duplicated everywhere we were going, for miles.

Sadly, I did not get a picture of the hawk that was having an absolute fit over all these obnoxious humans intruding into his territory, or the two deer who we suddenly realized were five feet away from the side of our car and keeping pace.

(There is a larger version of this one, if you care to click.)