Peak 1 in Idaho

It was September now and I had been in Idaho for five months now without doing one of my favorite things, mountain climbing. I had so many things going on and when we did get out it was more exploring the general area as opposed to going somewhere with a destination in mind. Another factor was the children. We couldn't get more than a mile down the trail before one or all of them would want to go back because they were "tired".

With the arrival of autumn we were blessed with the arrival of my Brother-in-Law, Duane, and his wife Tracie. Now if you have read some of my previous posts you know that with their presence I now have one of my two hiking buddies here with me. So of course we planned a hike.

The day we chose promised to be nice, being the only clear day for-casted for a while. It was noon when we parked at the trailhead at the the top of the Pack River Road, later than we wanted, but still leaving us with plenty of time. Our plan was to climb the Beehive, a rather unique looking mountain just a little ways off the road.

Setting off down an old road we are thinking about trying an approach from the north when we see a sharp looking mountain that has a hook to the peak looking only a couple miles off. Pulling out the map we find that it is Harrison Peak and that there is a lake below it aptly named Harrison Lake. Back where we parked there was a trail going to the lake and on the map it looked like it took an indirect route there, but the road we were on pointed almost straight at it. Figuring that if we just kept in the same general direction once the road ended we could get to the lake quicker than taking the trail, we quickly abandoned our idea of climbing the Beehive (it would always be there for another day), and we decided to try for Harrison peak.

Once the road ended it turned into a trail following an old overgrown logging road that was still going in the direction we wanted. Well, we figured that maybe this was a kind of backdoor shortcut to the lake, something only known by a handful of locals, and here we were, making our way down this secret path. Pretty soon even the trail was becoming more overgrown and it was getting hard to progress. After finding a small but happy handful of Wood-Ear mushrooms the trail comes to a creek. Wondering which way to go we notice what looks like the old remains of bridge pilings. A quick crossing with a steep climb up the other side brings us back on the logging road, more open than it has been for a while. After a hundred yards or so it is overgrown again and seeming to be heading a different direction than the lake so we decide to just start off on our own.

We climb a grassy hill and are soon making our way through a thick low brush which is easier to travel than the road was, eventually leading us into a dense forest. After pushing our way through this we find ourselves on the old road again. As we make our way up it we find it getting more and more overgrown and eventually we decide that perhaps we should leave this road again and angle northwest towards the trail. We knew we should be near the lake by now, so finding the trail should be easy, right? Well, it pretty much became a constant struggle uphill through almost impassable brush, (the locals call it Tag Alder) the only easy parts being the occasional deadfall that we could walk on like bridges. We quickly learned to search these out, greatly speeding up our travel.

a constant struggle

it just keeps going

Eventually we despair of ever finding the trail, especially when we come to an open area that finally affords us a view. Looking around we spot the hooked mountain that is Harrison Peak. And it is a lot further East than it should be. Obviously the old road did not go to the lake and we way overshot it. Above us a slope climbs up towards a ridge that looks like it might connect with the Peak, so we decide to keep going up.

Soon we are moving through a large boulder field and we are quickly hopping from rock to rock. After a hundred yards or so of this we come to a small stream of water sliding down the long slabs of granite that we are now following up. Looking down we see it drop about twenty feet into a very inviting pool. Wishing we had more time to go down there we decide to follow the stream up, maybe to find its source.

I can't help but wonder how many people have ever seen this pool?

It is very relaxing to trace the water like this, over bare stone, seeing it slide around through the ever so slight channel that it has carved over who knows how long. The higher we climb the smaller it becomes as we cross tiny tributaries that are little more than smears of dampness over the rock. Reaching the top we find a small trickle that is soon lost in the grasses from which it emerges. Sights like this are inspiring to me and after slowly making our way up into a new forest I feel rejuvenated.

The ridge we were heading toward was a false one as we can now see the land steeply rising past the forest. We find a good vantage point and are given our second disappointment. There will be no climbing Harrison today. The ridge above us does not connect easily with it and it will take us hours to traverse. Hours we do not have. But we still feel the need to be high so we decide to climb the ridge and enjoy the view.

We continue to climb higher, moving through a forest now, and once out of it we are given a cheering view, there is a peak in front of us! It is not on the forest service map we have and it looks to be smaller than Harrison, but hey, let's do it. First we must get to the base of it which involves a three-hundred yard climb up a steep rock face. This actually turns out to be quite fun and slightly easier than it looked. It was swept clean by glacier work leaving grooves and small pits making the footing pretty secure.

Reaching the top of the ridge we find ourselves to be on the Selkirk Ridge, the major dividing line of the Selkirk Range, and it is a wonderful view. Now we follow the ridge a short way and we are at the base of this unnamed peak. It looks to be lots of large sharp rocks with some tough little trees hanging on its north-west side. we take our time climbing, there are a lot of loose rocks with big drops (sorry mom, I won't say how big) under them. About ten minutes later and we are at the top. My first peak in Idaho. Now it feels like I really live here.

And now we see why we missed the lake. It is in a bowl almost directly under us and looks fairly easy to reach. The view from here is astounding. Three-hundred-sixty degrees of mountains around us. Looking north we are looking directly into Canada. West and we can see Priest Lake with the state of Washington splayed out behind it. To the east is the Cabinet Range, straddling the border of Idaho and Montana. Looking south we can see parts of Lake Pend Oreille.

Here we are!

Me, with Harrison Peak in the background

PANORAMA PICS FROM THE PEAK

North-West, North, North-East

North-East, East, South-East

South-East, South, South -West

South-West, West, North-West

Looking down on Harrison Lake

As we drink in the awe of being able to look at three different states and two nations I notice the shadow of the mountain we are on imposed over the lake. We both begin waving our arms and jumping up and down in the frentic hope that we can see our own shadows down there, but to no avail. Now it is time to make our way down. We decide to descend on the south-eastern slope (we came up from the west), which is rather steep with a lot of loose rock, but we do this without much difficulty.

Soon we are standing on a ridge above the lake. It should be fairly easy to follow the ridge down past the lake and get on the trail. But we always seem to have trouble staying away from lakes. We want to walk along the shore as we head for the trail. It doesn't look that hard to get down to it. A bit steep, but we are used to that. it turns out to be not so easy. We keep pushing on, telling ourselves (and each other) that it will get better, but it never does. It doesn't take long before we realize that it will be safer to keep going down than to try and climb back up. Finally, after all the cliffs, chutes, dead trees, broken roots, and falling rocks, we are at the bottom. Of course it took so long that I think we could have been half way to the truck had we stayed on the ridge instead of the few hundred yards we had just traversed.

One of the easier parts where we actually

are in very little danger

A reflection of Harrison on Harrison

Looking back up at some of what we came down

Now that we are at the lake I can see that it was worth it. There is something very soothing about a backcountry lakeshore or riverbank to slowly stroll along. (Strange considering my aversion to actually getting in the water). We now make our way to the eastern end of the lake where there is a small stream issuing from it and using my water filter, we fill up our water bottles and proceed to deparch ourselves. This is the creek that we thought we were following earlier in the day, but seeing how small it is I think I can remember seeing it dumping into the larger creek we were following and giving it little thought.

Leaving we find the trail (Harrison Lake trail #217) that takes us back down and we marvel at how easy it is to move, having a real path under our feet. The trail we are on is a steep one, but after about half a mile it splits (going left takes you into the Myrtle Creek area), levels out and widens, giving us the chance to walk side by side and recount some of the day's adventures. From here it is two or three miles to the truck. These pass by quickly as we are mostly focused on getting out now. About half way down we encounter a young moose that decides not to hang around once we are seen, so we stop and watch him disappear through the forest as I am still trying to soak in the idea that I live in a place that actually has moose!

Not long after this my mushroom trained eyes spot something. It turns out to be a beautiful specimen of the highly prized Boletus edulius, or King Bolete if you rather.

Duane displaying the prize

Soon we are back at Duane's truck, making it about five hours of hiking in some great new terrain. If there is one thing that I learned from this trip it is that I have a lot to figure out about the lay of the land. Back in Pagosa Country I could tell what to expect with a brief study of the land in between me and a mountain, but as should be obvious from this hike, it doesn't work quite as well here. From a difference in how the mountains were formed to the different plants, bushes, and trees, I look forward to my new education.

A Christmas Card (sort of)

Seeing as how we didn't get any Christmas cards mailed out again this year, I figured I could at least post a few pictures of us from earlier this year.

Merry Christmas everyone!

My first published article

Back in April, before we moved, I responded to the Mountain Gazzette, a magazine devoted to the Rocky Mountains, who were looking for articles about "Favorite Mountains". Well, the issue finally came out about a month ago and they actually used my story. So I figured I would post the article here so those who are interested can view it.

Pagosa Peak

Pagosa Peak, coming from a Native American name meaning “healing waters” that the nearby town of Pagosa Springs is famous for, was the first real peak that I ever climbed, close to sixteen years ago. While I have climbed many other peaks in the area since, I still try to get up there once a year if possible.

Now the years have been good to me in way other than giving me a love for mountains. My wife, Dawn, and I were married just a few weeks before that first climb and we have four beautiful children, Thalia age 8, Thaddeus age 6, Gwendolyn age 4,and Cianen age 2. We all get out in the mountains almost daily during the summer and fall to do a lot of wildcrafting, although most of the hiking and mountain climbing is left to me and my friends. So a couple of years ago we decided to try taking them up Pagosa Peak and see how they would do. They were very excited to be climbing a mountain so there was very little whining. But they were going a lot slower than I had expected and the clouds were beginning to build up. By the time we had reached the summit it had taken us about four hours to do three miles (albeit, almost every single step is uphill) and the last twenty minutes were through a misty kind of rain, with distant thunder that threatened more, and being above timberline we were totally exposed.

After a few minutes and a late, brief lunch we turned back and then the weather turned bad. Lightening began punching near us, deafening us with its thunder and sending Thalia into a panic. Then the downpour began. I have been through many mountain storms before, I even enjoy them for the most part, but this was almost too much for my little family. The trail had turned into a creek so my wife, with baby Cianen on her back, grabbed Thaddeus’s hand, while I grabbed Thalia’s and picked up Gwen while we slipped and slid our way down. More than once I had the two oldest just sit down and slide to a lower part of the trail. The rain stopped not to long after we were back in the trees but the path continued to be slick and treacherous, and with everyone wet and chilled I pushed them hard to keep moving fast until we reached our Jeep. The sun was shining when we got there and we all lay down to bask in its warming rays.

After that day Thalia was paranoid to go anywhere in the high country if we strayed more than a few hundred feet from the vehicle, frustrating us to no end. Finally, a little more than a year later, I convinced her to climb Pagosa Peak again, just the two of us, so we would be able to deal with her fear.

I chose a day that was forecast to be clear and we left very early, watching the almost full moon set while we drove. There was just enough light to see easily by when we reached the trailhead and it was cold, maybe around twenty degrees or so, being deep into autumn. We were no more than fifty steps down the trail when her fear kicked in and I eventually I was forcing myself not to get frustrated explaining and refuting all the wild things her fertile imagination thought could go wrong. At one point she was almost in hysterics, but she eventually calmed down when I just kept pushing her, not allowing any breaks or stops, and making her lead the way. From then on we just kept on the pace, she can be a steady hiker when she lets herself, and soon her confidence rose, and together we were able to rout her anxiety every time it arose.

By the time we reached the saddle, about two miles in, the sun was just emerging over it, greatly warming our spirits and not much further arrived at timberline. This is where the storm hit us last time, on an exposed ridge with very steep and rocky terrain on one side, and a sharp drop on the other. I could see the hysteria creeping up on Thalia again as we followed the steep ridge up, but I was able to talk it down and I tried to keep her occupied by constantly pointing out things we could see from here.

Before she even knew what was happening we were within a few minutes of the summit and she became very excited, telling me how glad she was we were doing this together. Pagosa Peak has a double peak actually, after you reach what you think is the top, you see another peak, slightly higher, just a couple hundred yards away, but with a deep dip in between the two. On Thalia’s first climb last year, it looked despairing to her seeing that there was still more to go. But this time she attacked it with relish, crossing it quicker than I thought she could.

Once there we removed our packs the conversation turned to her achievement, how happy and thankful she was that I had kept pushing her so we could experience this. A depth of fatherly pride welled up in me, and mingling with the sense of exhilaration that I always feel upon summiting a mountain, there was a profound and intense emotion that I had never experienced in the outdoors before.

This place that had once held a personal sacredness for me, being my first summit, had just changed, and I knew that I would no longer associate this mountain with just my own accomplishment anymore, but with my precious little girl overcoming her fears.

A nice view as we approach the peak

Some of the rocky crags as we get close

Thalia at the saddle

Getting Close! They actually used this picture of Thalia in the magazine.

Here you can see our dog Dulin sitting at the top waiting for us.

Two and a half weeks in Sandpoint

There are a lot of people out there wondering how things are going for us now, so I hope to be able to answer some of the questions here.

We are now in Sandpoint (which is in north Idaho) and so far things have gone pretty well. I am training to be Sous Chef at a great steakhouse called the Hydra. I feel very blessed with the owners who have gone out of their way to welcome us here. We are camping in a private campground a few miles south of Sandpoint in a large tent donated to us by my new boss and outfitted with with a camp table and cookstove.

We are in the process of trying to buy a house, just waiting on a full time paycheck stub (coming soon!) to make the bank happy enough to finance it.

It has been hard at times camping, the last two nights have been record setting lows, just dipping below freezing, but overall it has been good.

We took our first hike in the area today, about a mile round trip, to a place called Grouse Creek Falls. And along the way we found our first ever Black Morels! We only found three that were still good, but after being sauted they were more than enough to convince us that we might have a new favorite edible.

I hope to have a blog post soon on this wonderful fungus, and maybe another on our short hike.

Thank you all for your support and encouragement. (You know who you are.) Without it we might not have tried moving here.

Geno

We are here!

We made it in late last night and now is the fun and exciting job of finding a rental. I hope we find something quickly as I have to have the moving truck returned around noon Sunday...

Heading out

Just a quick post to let everyone know we are starting our move this morning. Goodbye Pagosa and all my friends here.

Flying Home

All right, just thought I would give an update as to how things went in Sandpoint this week. But I suppose first I should explain a bit more of why I was going there in the first place. I said before that I was going to try out for a chef position. Well I feel more freedom to write about this now that it is over. I had driven up to Sandpoint a couple months ago to look at some property and pass out my resume to various restaurants. Not much later I was contacted by the Executive Chef/Owner of a nice steakhouse called The Hydra. After a little correspondence I found out that he was looking for a sous chef and was willing to fly me there to try it out. Well, this has always been one of my ambitions, but not having any formal training in that way (i.e. culinary school or apprenticeship), so this opportunity seemed to come out of nowhere, I was only expecting employment as a regular cook.

So everything went well, it seems like nice atmosphere to work in and the menu is great. I spent some time trying to find a rental for us, something for just a month or two, as I cannot get financing to buy in the area until I have worked for thirty days.

The job should be a good fit for me and the owner thinks so as well, so now I only have to talk this over with the family and we should be moving very soon. My only hope is that something will turn up in the housing department before we arrive as it seems to cool for long-term camping.

And for anyone interested in looking at the menu that I will be working with soon, I have a link here. Let me know what you think.

http://www.hydrasteakhouse.com/index.html