Snow Camping in the Salmon Mtns

It began with the usual rush and chaos of getting out of town. It didn't help that I had planned an open-house for work on Thursday evening and hadn't packed before as I had hoped to. The purpose of the whole adventure was to get some head space out in the wilderness and meet up with my good friend Paul from Missoula. There was a lot of intention going into the weekend simply because I needed a change in scenery and a chance to breathe deeply for a while.

The wilderness is very soothing and therapeutic for me and at the same time it's extremely mysterious and challenging. Somehow it seems to clarify and put my life into perspective (at least one perspective). A long road trip by yourself is always a good thing to do when you need to think things through deeply. Unfortunately, due to my extremely late start, the nature of the route, and the distance I needed to travel, the drive out to Salmon ID from Boise at night didn't allow my mind work through my current troubles and past at all. It took me 6+ hours of white knuckle driving at an average speed of 45 mph due to the incredible amount of deer and elk on the windy roads. I arrived in Salmon at 2am and passed out in a hotel room Paul had secured for us that night.

We woke late and had a leisurely breakfast at The Coffee Shop (the only place for breakfast in Salmon besides Burger King and convenience stores) and proceeded to make a plan for where to spend the next 2 1/2 days skiing and camping in the mountains. I gave Paul the 15 minute run down on my life then we purchased a couple of maps and got some good recommendations from a local sportsman shop. The interaction with the shop owner was the first of many to bring up the wolf management and de-listing situation in Idaho. He told us that the people in town never were happy that "The Environmentalists" came into their town and shoved wolf re-introduction down their throats. He said wolves were making a natural and steady comeback and many had been sighted before re-introduction began.

After a quick stop for whiskey and a few key grocery items, we headed off to Williams Creek Summit just 20 miles or so south west of town. The drive up was beautiful and my excitement started to build as we climbed up towards the snow level. Shortly after reaching the snow line we stopped to help a fella who had slid his truck into the snow bank. Paul threw out his chains under Tom's tires and he was out. He had been cutting wood in the forest and had smashed the passenger side of his truck with a log. The back window was broken out and he proceeded to tell us how he was just standing there and a tree came rolling down the hill and crashed into his truck. Likely story Tom, but it's always fun to meet mountain characters.

A few more miles and we were at the top of the pass where we began gearing up for snow camping and skiing. It was ridiculous and sort of funny how ill-prepared we were in terms of food and cook stuff. We had one heavy small pot for cooking and melting water (ALWAYS TAKE 2!) and had all kinds of heavy, hard to prepare food for meals. I won't go into the details, but needless to say the next time I go snow camping in the woods I'm taking only dehydrated foods and plenty of whiskey.

Once we hit the trail it was a great feeling. It's always that moment that I think to myself- I need to do this more often - why don't I get out here more? One obvious answer that came to mind was my family li. With two young sons and a wife with a full-time job as well, it's amazing I can get out on trips like this at all. It was perfect to be out there with just Paul. He's so mellow and happy to not have any agenda at all, which was exactly what I needed to be able to unwind my hectic mind. It also helped that he's a really good listener, has great insights and is more sarcastic than any person I've ever met, yet sincere at the same time.

We found a perfect spot in the woods protected from the wind and blowing snow, set up our tent, gathered some wood and went for a short jaunt to explore the area. It was a great location for views of the Bitterroot Range, the Lemhi Range and the Bighorn Crags over in the Frank Church Wilderness.

Dinner that night was a huge disaster and I have to take full credit for screwing it up. Paul put a lot of effort into preparing some of his hand picked morel mushrooms only to have it ruined by a risotto mix that should have never been for sale in the first place. The problem was that I never read the ingredients until after we both decided that the food was actually inedible. It reminded me of my trek through the Pyrenees with my brother when we ate only awful pasta primavera for 8 days. My brother still gives me a hard time about that and I have a feeling that Paul won't let me live that risotto meal down either.

The next day we found a great burned-out northern aspect with great powder and about 1,000 ft vertical only a mile or so from camp. We took our time touring and enjoying the incredible scenery and the rhythmic sensation of skinning up the mountain and through the woods in silence.

The tour back to camp climaxed with the skies opening up and revealing the distant Bitterroots in their full alpen-glow glory.

The meal of salmon and whiskey finished us off well and we were in the tent and asleep like babies before my kids usually are.

An early ski out punctuated by a pleasant conversation with a local backcountry skier and his wife out for a day tour ended the skiing portion of our trip. We headed back down the mountain to town for some small town food and our final goodbyes.

It was early enough that I had the time to take a great side hike up to Goldbug Hot Springs south of Salmon. It was a nice contrast to be hiking in shoes with no snow around and headed up to the headwaters of Warm Springs Creek for a soak in the hot agua. Shortly after I arrived at the springs after the 2 mile climb the only other visitors packed up and left. It was sunny and I was alone soaking in one of the most spectacular hot springs I've ever been to. The situation was hard to beat really.

I was back to my car in time to be able to drive the 5 hours back to Boise in full daylight. Finally I had the road-trip time to let my mind absorb the passing landscape and contemplate how my life had gotten so complicated and hectic and what I could do about it. After it was all said and done the trip was an incredibly fun adventure that I really needed.