When the Cow Comes Home to Lava Hot Springs

This one.  This one is about the pictures. I knew we could get some good pictures. (Mooochas gracias to Jena for taking them.)

COWABUNGA!

I LOVE diving boards and I LOVE Lava Hot Springs, Idaho. "Lava" is pronounced with a short a like "lad" not a schwa like "lawn." And, yes, I know that's not how you pronounce what comes out of a volcano. But this is a little town in Idaho. Not molten sludge seeping from the earth. (Although, it WAS pretty hot today in Lava.)

I learned to swim in this pool in the 70's when my parents owned a bar and restaurant called the Lava Lounge in the town of just under 500.  Are you pronouncing it correctly?  After their divorce, I'd go visit my dad on the weekends and sometimes during the week in the summer. I remember a few trips to this pool by myself to just swim and dive and be young and free. My dad died when I was 13, and got sick when I was 12. Holy cow! I must have been younger than that for my solo trips to the pool. Can you even imagine letting an 11 year old walk through a little town and go swimming by herself? There were early or late weekday hours when I was the only one in the entire complex with the pool to myself.

I first jumped off of their 10 meter (33 foot high dive platform) all by myself. No one was there to cheer, encourage or cajole, but it didn't matter. I didn't need it and I had a ball flying through the sky and bouncing off the boards. If I hadn't have been able to venture out and discover this kind of fun on my own, I doubt that I'd be able to truly enjoy adventures and fun with others.  The ole...You gotta be happy with yourself  and by yourself before you can truly be happy with others...yeah. I started learning that right here when I'd return home to Lava Hot Springs.

Suited up and ready to jump!

That "No Running" is SO for me right now. And I'm never so naked under a cow suit. This is weird.

Kindly waiting for the kid below me. Although...
getting crushed by a cow in the Lava pool would be a GREAT story for him.

I took diving lessons as a calf. Look at those hooves. Can you tell?

Almost angelic with the clouds behind me.

And thus concludes my smiliest jump & entry from a diving board ever.

That. Was. Awesome.
(the clinging, skin tight cow suit is not awesome.)

Didn't you do this as a kid? Why don't we do it any more? Sometimes it takes a cow suit to let yourself act like a kid again. (clearly)