- Hell's
Canyon and Sawtooth Mountains,
Idaho
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- Off to Idaho
- Things were pretty quiet around Harvey after we
deposited Benjamin with his volunteer work group in
Montana. But we didn't have long until new company
arrived. We motored back to Salt Lake City, and soon
picked up our next guest, his older brother Blake. He
had just returned from spending ten months in
Venezuela as an exchange student sponsored by the
Rotary Clubs. He could only be with us for about ten
days, but now we were ready for another vacation
adventure. Idaho was an area we'd always wanted to
explore. So welcoming Blake aboard, we headed north .
. . that is north by northwest.
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- Our fun began just north of Salt Lake
City at the Golden
Spike National Historic Site. The
historic site sits in the 'middle of
nowhere' in northern Utah . . not far from
the Idaho border. Located 32 miles west of
Brigham City, this is the location where
the east and west tracks of the
transcontinental railroad met.
Representatives of the Central Pacific
(who laid 690 miles of track) and Union
Pacific (who laid 1,086 miles of track)
met on May 10, 1869 to drive the golden
spike completing the project . . . or
that's what we thought before this
visit.
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- This historic location served the transcontinental
line for a few years, but was then abandoned as
improved rail routes were developed to the south.
Today however, 1.7 miles of track have been restored
on the original roadbed. We admired the bright colored
engines, Jupiter and Number 119, that reenacted the
historic event. These two engines are detailed
reproductions of the original machines of the same
name; both were lost to the scrap heaps shortly after
the turn of the twentieth century. We also enjoyed
hearing about the many misconceptions (Read 'The
Last Spikes') related to the historic event. In
the picture (Above right), Annette is pointing east
and Larry is pointing west. If you want to explore
more about railroads, check out our Railroad
page.
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- Next after a brief stop for refueling, we headed
north into Idaho. We left the interstate and proceeded
across country on a two-lane, winding road. As we
pulled-up at a stop sign and its T-intersection and
were trying to decide whether we needed to turn left
or right, a car pulled up beside us and honked. Our
first knee-jerk reaction was annoyance, because we
hadn't been stopped more than a number of seconds. But
seeing these people's faces and gestures quickly
diverted our attention to the rear of our rig. We
pulled off to the shoulder and got out to examine the
situation more closely. We discovered that our hitch
was almost entirely disconnected. It was more
accurately described as being cracked and bent from
the frame of the motorhome. We could hardly believe
it! The Explorer was fine, but it had bumped into the
back of the RV (We hadn't felt that hit), broken the
rear grillwork, and cracked the fiberglass body. The
tow bar was also cracked and severely damaged, holding
on by a mere strand. Thanks, thanks, thanks to the
people who noticed the problem and brought it to our
attention. Without them, we would surely have lost the
tow bar in just a few minutes, and our toad would have
gone flying.
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- Now some of you may be wondering, why hadn't we
seen this problem ourselves? Well coincidentally, our
rear camera/video system had also recently gone
on-the-fritz. We had already scheduled that to be
serviced as soon as we returned to Salt Lake
City.
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- So now we unhooked 'Harvey,' unbolted
the entire hitch assembly from the
motorhome frame, and were then able to
'limp' on into Boise. The next morning
found us looking up an RV repair shop and
accessing the damages. There we found that
locating a replacement hitch and tow bar
plus completing the emergency repairs to
get us going would take a couple of days -
- so while Harvey was in 'sick bay,' we
decided to make the best of our situation
and spend the following day exploring a
nearby area, Hell's Canyon.
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- Hell's Canyon
- On our trip from Boise to Hell's
Canyon, we drove through a large area that had
recently burned. This was another summer of forest and
grass fires in the West. Roadside burns are a
particular problem here, where the combination of a
careless smoker or an unmuffled engine spark and dry
brush and grass can make a devastating
combination.
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- On the two-lane blacktop highway to Hell's Canyon,
we also came upon a flock of wild turkeys crossing the
roadway. Annette got out and tried getting a closeup
photograph, but only managed to 'shoo' them down the
fenceline. We did end up with a few distant photo
shots of them. Shortly back on our way, the twisty
roads and shifting terrain of scrublands changing to
mountains, valley ranchland, and then canyons made for
an interesting trip.
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- We finally arrived in Hell's Canyon, it was a huge
pit - - just like the travel guides said. We
considered what those pioneers of the Oregon
Trail days must have thought when they hit this
formidable obstacle. It took longer than we had
planned to make our way to and down to the end of the
canyon. We needed to be back in Boise by 5 p.m. in
order to pick up the repaired motorhome, so we now
considered our options while eating our turkey
sandwiches and watching the kayakers navigate the
Snake river canyon. We chose to take a backroad up-out
and over the canyon rim to then cut across the forest
and ranchland for our return trip. It was a much
shorter route distance-wise but with steep gravel
roads and necessary switchbacks out, it could actually
end up taking more time than our long route out that
morning. As we neared the rim-top (after a twenty
minute climb), we stopped for Blake to take a picture
back down our steep pathway. Around the next bend,
there was a beautiful bighorn
sheep crossing the road. We added its photo to our
growing collection of bighorns. The rest of the trip
back to Boise was uneventful except for our watching
the clock. We barely made it back in time to pick up
the motorhome.
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- With temporary repairs completed, we made a phone
call to the Holiday Rambler center in Sandy, Utah. Uh,
you know that service we were to have done on our
camera system . . . well now we need to add a few
items such as fiberglass repair, new grill, gravel
guard, paint and the like. Think goodness, we're under
warranty for this. We were now ready to make a
multiple-day loop from Boise up through the Sawtooth
mountains, down through Crater of the Moons, and back
to Salt Lake City.
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- Sawtooth Mountains
![](blakecrk.jpg)
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- The trip from Boise to Stanley was
breathtaking. Blake took a siesta through
some of it. Having spent a year in
Venezuela, we guessed he was used to those
afternoon naps that residents of that
country are believed to take. Along the
river, we saw many rafters and kayakers
dodging the rapids. We arrived late in the
afternoon at the Elk
Mountain Resort, located just outside
the town of Stanley. The small wooded
campground had great views of the
mountains. After finishing our meal of
Dutch oven chilli and cornbread, we took
an evening walk around the grounds. Nights
were cool here - - temperature-wise
too.
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- The stars were beautiful. We met another couple
who were also out there stargazing. One of them was a
retired air force pilot who pointed out some of the
major constellations overhead. Here in rural Idaho,
there was not any bright haze from a major city nor
the glare of security lights that are found back in
the Midwest. It was about 9:30 p.m. and the night sky
became more brilliant with each minute. We five
laughed and talked, shared experiences until one of
campground employees yelled for us to 'pipe down'
since it was after quiet hours. We thought quiet hours
usually started at 10, but hey - - it was getting
late, so time to shut down. We did think it was funny
that a retired couple and the three of us constituted
a rowdy crowd. Maybe, it must of been that
nineteen-year-old Blake? Anyway, time to head back to
Harvey.
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- The next day we visited two old neighboring gold
towns north of Stanley called Bonanza and Custer. They
are part of what is known as the Land
of the Yankee Fork Historic Area. We also
took-a-look at the nearby mining dredge, weighing a
humongous 988 tons (Still there for all to see, below
center). It was transported here and then assembled in
1940. For the next twelve years, it operated to dig up
and down the Yankee Fork river channel. Machinery
inside the dredge was used to wash and separate gold
from the rock, gravel, and dirt. The dredge's former
owner later donated it to the Forest Service. Today
former dredge workers and their families volunteer to
continue its restoration and conduct tours.
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- In the two towns, we found more displays of old
mining equipment (Stamp mill, below right). We enjoyed
learning about the history of the area. One
fascinating story was discovered at a town cemetery.
In July 1879, a recently married couple, Richard and
Agnes King, were found murdered in their cabin. Their
story was briefly explained on a plaque at their grave
site. A jealous, rejected suitor was the main suspect,
but no evidence was found to link him to the crime. He
moved on to another community, but years later when he
died, he was still carrying Agnes' picture in a
locket.
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- Our second day trip took us south of Stanley. We
purchased a book about the ghost towns of these
Sawtooth
Mountains and selected one that would be far
enough off the road that we should have it largely to
ourselves. We followed a gravel road up into the
mountains, twenty miles or so off the beaten track. In
places, the road looked more like a trail than a
vehicle route. As we progressed further out, the trees
began to close in upon our track. We decided it would
be prudent to take the bikes off their roof rack and
lock them to one of the nearby trees. If you've read
our Mile
High Mishap story, you know why we're a little
paranoid. We tied a ribbon to a roadside tree, hoping
that we would spot it and quickly find the bikes on
our return trip.
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- The road widened a little and led into
a mountain valley. There were summer
pastures and livestock up here. We crossed
a mountain stream on its gravel bed (Right
photograph). Shortly after leaving the
pasture and reentering the woods, we came
upon a more treacherous stream crossing.
Here there was no real bridge nor a good
gravel bottom. Instead there were just
two-pair of slippery logs placed across
the stream, one-pair spaced to fit each
set of wheels. The wheels slid into the
groove and we snaked on across.
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- We crossed more smaller, open streams - - that was
probably the same stream crossed two or three times -
- before heading up one more, steeper-than-ever hill
climb. As our guidebook told us, this is a 4-wheel
drive road that is sometimes impassable. Blake asked,
"Are you sure we want to drive up there?" Sure, hang
on.
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![](xplor.jpg)
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- We made it up the last steep climb to
the plateau ghost mining community of
Washington Basin. It was pretty steep, but
not as steep as it looks in the picture on
the left. But the views at the top were
breathtaking. A small mountain stream was
surrounded by a wildflower-filled meadow
slope. A large, gaunt dead tree stood by
itself on a slightly-higher plateau. We
had fun climbing in the tree as shown in
the picture (Below - center
left).
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- George Washington Blackman's long-abandoned mine
shaft, mine tailings, and a bit-of-his-cabin remained.
He was one of the few black miners in the area and was
known for his hospitality. While Larry and Blake
searched around for signs of gold at one of the mines,
Annette explored the remains of the cabin. They did
find some great samples of 'fools gold.' The picture
below on the right shows Larry and Blake halfway down
the mountain searching a mine opening. A short hike to
a cliff revealed a dam that Washington built decades
earlier. We spent a few hours exploring the area and
its ruins. We even sat out a brief afternoon shower,
wind-driven rain that at this elevation contained a
fair amount of sleet.
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When it was time to head back down the
mountain, we did locate where we stashed the
bikes. The views on the trip down seemed even
more beautiful than during our trip up. At
the base of the mountain, we visited a
restored ranger station. The late afternoon
lighting, clouds, and the play of light and
shadow around the lonely building were
perfect for photographing (Right)
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This area of the state is one that we would like to
explore again someday. There are endless 4-wheel drive
roads, boondock campsites, trails, hot springs, and
more interesting natural areas.
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- Sawtooth City and Ketchum
- Day three in Stanley found us heading south toward
Ketchum, when we noticed a sign for a Passport
in Time project and decided to investigate. This
archaeology
project involved doing a detailed surface survey
and mapping the old historic site of longtime-gone,
Sawtooth City. It was fun and interesting to learn
about the project, talk with the project
manager-archeologist, and watch and visit with some of
the volunteer workers.
-
We decided that it would be rewarding to
volunteer for a program like this sometime
down the road. Here, an intricate
string-lined grid was used to define the
area. People in this picture (Right
photograph) were in charge of logging every
item found on the surface of their designated
area. They found things like bits of pottery
and glass, lots of tin cans, a shoe clasp,
and other objects from the 1880's boomtown.
Through their detailed work, the location of
the Chinese section, some of the brothel
cribs, and the taverns had already been
determined.
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- After that interesting morning break, we continued
down the highway to Ketchum. There we stopped off at
Hemingway's
grave site, explored an art fair, and then visited
a bookstore before journeying back to our Elk Mountain
Resort campsite.
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- The RV park had a small cafe that specialized in
ribs and homemade pie, and that's where we ate our
final night in Stanley. The ribs and the pie were both
great, so much so that we featured them on our
Quest
for Great Food page!
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- Craters of the
Moon
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- Next we headed the rig south and
eventually began to enter volcano country.
Rather than a single volcano, this area of
the state is covered by fissure vents,
volcanic cones, and lava flows from the
Great Rift that occurred around 15,000
years ago. The ground here is covered by
large chunks of ancient lava. As we
entered the Craters
of the Moon campground at the National
Park, we felt like we were in another
world. Big piles of ash and lava covered
the park. Our RV was nestled between a
small tree and a pile of lava (Left).
Everywhere we looked, lava!
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- The park is organized as a seven-mile loop road
through the lava beds. We followed that route the next
day and stopped to see the sights along the way. We
took a hike to the top of a huge cinder mountain. It
seemed like each time we neared what we thought was
the top, another section of the cinder cone (Below
right) appeared. At the summit, we were surprised to
find a large old tree (Below center). From this high
viewpoint, we could look out over the entire park and
had great views on all sides. Next, we headed to the
lava tubes for a hike underground (Below left). We
explored the cave trails including Beauty Cave, Boy
Scout Cave, and Indian Tunnel.
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- Although we could have explored further, it was
time to head back to Salt Lake City and drop Blake off
at the airport to catch his flight back to Illinois.
His freshman year at Eastern
Illinois University begins soon.
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- Other
References:
- Clark, B. (1998). Scenic
Driving Idaho. Helena, MT: Falcon Publishing,
Inc.
- Fuller, M. (1998). Trails
of the Sawtooth and White Cloud Mountains (3rd
Ed.). Edmonds, WA:
- Signpost
Books.
- Maughan, R. and Maughan, J.
J. (1995). Hiking Idaho. Helena, MT: Falcon
Publishing, Inc.
- Rivers, K. E. (1997).
Volume I: Central Idaho - Idaho's Scenic Highways:
A Mile-to-Mile Road
- Guide. Ketchum,
ID: Great Vacations, Inc.
- Sparling, W. C. (1996).
Southern Idaho Ghost Towns. Caldwell, ID:
Caxton Printers, Ltd.
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Created by
Annette
Lamb and
Larry
Johnson,
7/01.
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