America’s Longest Road Twists and Turns in Idaho and is Worth a Drive

Across much of the country, it’s a straight road.  Idaho has a different tale.  Route 20 is almost 3,400 miles long.  Quite a few miles of that total are in a compact region of the Boise National Forest.  The road has some wild gyrations through the mountains.

I’m not sure how tourists handle the drive, but locals make some hairpin turns at 65 miles per hour.  Or as I’ve learned, some even faster, but I try and obey the speed limit, and I slow on some of the turns, even if I don’t see a sign recommending I take it easy.

In eastern Idaho, the road looks like a desert movie set.  From Blackfoot to Arco, you drive along on a hot summer day, and you can witness the heat rising and see an occasional mirage.

The road has some anomalies.  Once I was driving east from Bend, Oregon, on my way home to Idaho.  There was a dip in the road, and there must have been a temperature inversion.  My windshield immediately fogged over, and in the sunlight,t  couldn’t see a thing.  At 65 miles per hour.  I slowed fast, rolled some windows down, and it cleared.

Route 20 is so vast that I can claim to have lived in three places it passed through, and I went to college in a town located on a spur called 20A.  I all four places there were rolling hills, horse farms, and apple orchards.

Near the top of my bucket list is a goal to drive the entire length, with cameras and microphones to tell the story of America’s Highway.  But in Idaho, I believe the road is at its best.  I was thinking that as I drove with white knuckles around a couple of corners over the weekend, and loved every thrilling minute!

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