Tom is doing a six week rotation in Boise, so I came out for a brief visit! It was my first(ish) time in Boise, so I tried to cram as much in as I could to my week!
- Day 1: Wednesday, Arriving in Boise
- Day 2: Thursday, Korean Market and Thrifting Galore
- Day 3: Friday, Coffee Shops Downtown and the Basque Quarter
- Day 4: Saturday, Hiking, Hyde Park, and Breweries
- Day 5: Sunday, Thrift Stores and Downtown Exploring
- Day 6: Monday, Thrifting and Coffee Shop Working
Top Recommendations for Boise
- Get a beer and ice cream flight at The Stil.
- Get a beer flight at Barbarian Brewing.
- Grab tapas at the Basque Market.
- Try a potato sundae at Westside Drive in.
- Visit a hot spring and do some hiking in the Sawtooth Mountains (or at least Boise National Forest, if you’re not willing to make the 2-3 hour drive).
- Have a photo shoot in Freak Alley.
- Treat yourself to some old-school charm with a drive in movie or roller skating.
- Do a thrift store crawl (or at least hit up “The Shop” downtown).
Day 1: Wednesday, Arriving in Boise
This barely counts as a day as I arrived late that night but I flew in as I finished the book Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton. I would highly recommend it, particularly if you live in the Seattle area. The book is set in Seattle just after an apocalyptic event, as told from the perspective of a domesticated bird, S.T. (Shit Turd), who affectionately refers to humans as mofos and sets out on a quest to save them as they descend into a zombie-like state. Beyond just being a great and very funny read, the book is a love letter to Seattle and affectionately describes landmarks and neighborhoods, which makes it all the more trippy to read in the city.
Day 2: Thursday, Korean Market and Thrifting Galore
Most of this day was spent catching up on work but in the afternoon I walked (not advisable, but I didn’t have a car) around a car dealership-dominated area to the west of Boise and found the strip mall of my dreams: a Korean Market and three thrift stores.
Korean Market
I’m a total sucker for Korean Markets and this one, though small, did not disappoint!
They had homemade kimchi, tons of soju (obviously), and, most importantly, the honey butter potato chips I’m obsessed with and haven’t been able to find in Seattle.
Armed with a snack of melon-flavored coconut milk and a castella cake, I tackled the four thrift stores in close proximity.
Thrift Stores
The strip mall contained: Savers (the same thing as Value Village – sometimes slightly more pricey but always a great selection), Vets 4 Success Thrift Store, and Idaho Ranch Youth Thrift Store (a common chain in Boise). Desert Industries Thrift Store was across the street and is also always one of my favorite options with a huge selection and very reasonable prices.
As I anticipated, Savers and Desert Industries were my favorites of the trip and I got two pieces from Desert Industries – an adorable petite sized dark denim longsleeved shirt with subtle rodeo-style detailing and a vintage Gap kids XL jacket (meaning it actually fits me).
Idaho Ranch Youth Thrift Store was worth a pass in my opinion but Vets 4 Success, while I didn’t find anything, seemed like the kind of place you could pick up a designer piece for only a few dollars if you had a sharp eye.
Dinner at Juniper
For dinner, Tom and I met up with my sister’s best friend (who recently moved to Boise) at Juniper – a cute restaurant downtown with reasonably priced entrees (~$20) and unique cocktails from $10-$12. I would recommend making a reservation in advance!
Tom got a duck ramen (really tasty!) and I got a wedge salad (named Ballard Cheese – apparently after a Ballard farm in Idaho, though I got really excited thinking it might be Seattle) and the Panda Garden cocktail, which had yuzu and lychee liquor.
Day 3: Friday, Coffee Shops Downtown and the Basque Quarter
After an early morning meeting, my caffeine deprivation really kicked in and I headed downtown to do some work at a coffee shop.
With the plethora of options, I decided to start at Form and Function – a super cute coffee shop with lots of wood, concrete, and subway tiles. Wifi worked well after some initial lagging and there was decent outlet access and tasty treats for reasonable prices. I got my cappuccino and a fruit bar for under $7, which is stellar compared to Seattle prices.
Form and Function
I hunkered down at Form and Function until it closed at 5 and then moved down the street to Flying M Coffee House, which was delightfully quirky and colorful and served extremely foamy cappuccinos (my preference) and had some tasty looking treats like “peanut butter chewies.”
When Tom got off work, we popped over to the Basque Market (Boise has a huge Basque population) for tapas. Tom got a torta with croquetas (AMAZING) and I got a very generous amount of brussel sprouts. I also grabbed a white wine slushie topped with berries and red wine (really good) for a total dinner cost of $28, including a 20% tip. Really affordable and great food!
Day 4: Saturday, Hiking, Hyde Park, and Breweries
We had an early start off to the Stack Rock trail – an easy trail in the Boise National Forest that was a fairly flat 10 miles and took us 5 hours (including a 40 minute bouldering interlude). The trailhead is only a 30 minute drive from Boise, though up a windy two lane road that is a real pain if you’re stuck behind a slow car or prone to motion sickness (fortunately we aren’t). At the end of the trail, the “stack rock” was a pretty sizeable rock formation of multiple boulders that was a fun (but challenging) climb up! I made it almost to the top before I gave up for fear of getting stuck or having a tumble.
In the afternoon, we headed to Hyde Park, a cute neighborhood in the “north downtown” area to peruse the 2 block commercial stretch and do some work at the Hyde Park Coffee House.
After a little breather at home, we grabbed an Uber/Lyft (only $13!) downtown for an evening of brewery hopping to hit up Barbarian Brewing and Woodland Empire.
Barbarian Brewing 
Woodland Empire
Barbarian was my favorite of the night and we tried:
- Reese’s Pieces Ice Cream Ale
- Odin’s Table Bier (Light Belgian Ale)
- Peach Matcha Sour
- Purple Reign (Imperial Kettle Sour with lemons and blackberries)
- Cherry Pie Sour
- S’mores Ice Cream Ale
I liked most of them a lot (except the S’mores one, which tasted too much like chocolate syrup for me) and I really liked how they were willing to go out there with what they tried! The flight was a super reasonable $13 for 6 tastes.
At Woodland Empire, we tried:
- Pilsner
- After the Love Has Gone (Mexican Mocha Lager)
- Yikes Stripes (Saison brewed with local plums and peaches)
- Strawberry Shortcake Nitro
My favorite of the bunch was the Strawberry Shortcake (even though I don’t normally like nitros) but I still preferred basically all of the Barbarian beers. I did like the venue though and you could get mexican food from next door or play pinballs. The flight was also a really reasonable $6 for 4 tastes and you could scale it easily.
Too full of beer to try the other breweries, we wandered over to Chip Cookies so I could grab one of their gourmet chocolate chip cookies (I’m still working on the cookie as of Tuesday morning) and Wiseguy Pizza Pie to grab some huge slices of “Horny Hawaiian” (Hawaiian pizza with jalapenos) and pepperoni, which were both great and really satisfied our slightly tipsy drunchies.
One thing great thing about our night on the town was that there were a lot of options of cute, trendy places to go but places were only 50-75% full so it was easy to find a place to sit. Prices are also WAY more affordable than Seattle so our night our only cost about $60 ($30 transport, $20 beer, $10 snacks) versus the easy $100+ we would spend in Seattle, especially if we Ubered or Lyfted both ways.
Day 5: Sunday, Thrift Stores and Downtown Exploring
With an opportunity to use the car, I decided to use the morning for some intensive thrifting.
In total I went to:
- Thriftology
- Restyle Animal Rescue Thrift Store
- Idaho Youth Ranch Thrift Store (on Broadway)
- Goodwill (on Vinnell)
Of all of them, I only had real luck at Goodwill but the Restyle Animal Rescue Thrift Store had pretty decent stuff as well (Thriftology is a hard skip).
Goodwill was fully decked out in Halloween costumes (i.e. vintage racks galore) and I found a lovely soft pair of lavender leggings (with pockets!) for $5 and a two piece pants and tank formal set in an olive-y green for $13. The tank I probably won’t wear but the pants are a 4 petite and fit PERFECTLY as a cute pair of high waisted straight leg slightly cropped “pixie” pants.
For lunch, we headed to Lemon Tree and I got the sausage and pear sandwich as a 1/2 sandwich combo with prickly pear lemonade, which were both pretty solid, before heading to The District Coffee House across the street.
Lemon Tree 
The District 
Lovely cappuccino art!
I decided (in an act of hubris) that I was going to walk all of downtown Boise so I took on the somewhat crazed task of zig-zagging down every downtown city block. This (obviously) ended up being longer than I anticipated (2 hours) as I covered the area by the zoo and the University across the water.
My top things I saw were:
- The Stil
- Freak Alley
- The Record Exchange
- Mixed Greens
The Stil was an adorable (and packed) ice cream shop in the south part of town that does ice cream / beer / wine flights. They have super quirky flavors and we ended up trying:
- After School Special (Peanut Butter & No Bake Cookie)
- Form & Function (Lavender Latte)
- Ed & Carl Take Reno (Honey Bourbon)
- Jack-o-lantern (Pumpkin, Bourbon, & Maple)
Along with a stout, porter, tangerine wheat, and coffee stout. The beers were great too but they’re not specific to the company or necessarily local.
Tom’s favorite was the peanut butter ice cream and mine was the pumpkin one, though I couldn’t taste the bourbon or maple. The Honey Bourbon was OK but a little bland in comparison and the Lavender Latte was just on the cusp of too lavender-y.
Freak Alley is a public art gallery of murals and graffiti in downtown and a real hotbed for Instagram pics. Tom graciously took a bunch of pictures of me as I tried to remember how to smile for photos (and failed).
The Record Exchange is an adorable used record and CD store with a more “shop front” and cafe component. The cafe portion was my favorite part as they have an old school diner set up and they have an awesome selection “adhesive mini posters” for really reasonable prices!
Mixed Greens would be an awesome place to pick up an “Idaho” gift for someone as it’s a well-curated shop with locally made jewelry and other Idaho merch like retro-styled trucker hats.
Day 6: Monday, Thrifting and Coffee Shop Working
Monday, I had a few meetings in the morning but went for lunch at Elmer’s Restaurant near the university, which turned out to be a real “old people” restaurant but had great German pancakes (which I what I went for). After lunch, I took a quick spin by The Shop and the Dick Eardley Senior Center Thrift Store for my last Boise thrifting stops.
Though I often find senior centers have great goods, this one is worth passing on. The Shop on the other hand was a real treasure trove and my favorite stop of the trip! I picked up a Brooks Brothers shirt for Tom, a silky Pendleton top for myself, a pair of leggings, and a cute plaid wood overshirt – all for under $30.
I holed up in Thomas Hammer Coffee for the rest of the day, which was a bit too corporate for my taste but did have great wifi and plug access and was a comfortable place to spend several hours!
In the evening, we did a quick spin by Play it Again Sports (good used sports collection, not a great clothing selection) and REI to look for a raincoat for me before we headed home so I could pack for my flight early the next morning – thus concluding my Boise trip!
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