Redfish Lake, ID (My favorite place on earth)

Redfish Lake

Overall Score: 10

Price: 10

Kid Friendly: 10

Parent Friendly: 10

Easy Access: who cares, worth it

This is by far the most biased review I will give on this blog. Redfish Lake is a magical place that my family has been going to forever....well at least the last 50 years. I wrote high school essays about Redfish. I asked some family members

for memories of my late uncle and every single one of them could think of a Redfish memory first. It also (unbiasedly) happens to be the perfect family friendly place. Its camping, but like cozy camping (not quite glamping since the toilets are still just holes in the ground). The roads are paved and the sites are clean and spacious.

Sites are big enough to do sing along/dance alongs with the whole group by the fire. And even though the place fills up in the first hour that its open....I have never felt crowded there. 

The water is colder than cold...straight from a glacier which makes dares and double dares to get in that much better. Its also very clear water so you can kayak around and check out all the dead trees and fish down there.  The shoreline is full of sand and the perfect place to chat with family or read a book. And if Santa brought you a metal detector for Christmas, it is the perfect place to go treasure hunting. 

The General Store is a must! Meaning, you must get a pocket knife or a minnow net, or a sweatshirt, or all three every year because one universal truth is that you can never have too many Redfish things. Also, a nice cool Huckleberry soda screams Idaho camping!

We were lucky enough to have family members watch our kiddos early one morning so Drew and I could do the 12 mile hike around the lake. Every single view is the best! On the far side, there are rocks ("cliffs") to jump off of. The hike has a very low elevation profile and I think if we took a good portion of the day, our kids could do out too. 

There are plenty of things to do close by like the Salmon Fish Hatchery. They stock a small fishing pond for the kids and every single kid caught a fish within the hour. They even have poles there for the kids to use. And when fishing is no longer fun (about 10 minutes for my little guys) you can feed the fish in the holding tanks (think 100 Shayna's and just one square of chocolate dropped in the middle of us....it is quite entertaining). 

And there are miles and miles of trails nearby. Most extremely family friendly. This year we ponied up and bought a book with all the local trails so we can start venturing off to new ones. 

Magically, every Saturday at Redfish is Smokey the Bear's birthday. They throw him a big birthday party at the rangers station complete with balloons and cake (because with smores, banana boats, and cobbler there just isn't enough sugar).  Many of the weekend nights, the lodge also has live bands/singers come and perform. 

I hope when I die that I can look down and see my kid's kid's kids enjoying Redfish as much as we do!