Utah is an amazingly beautiful state. I feel very blessed to have grown up in Utah with all of the beauty of the mountains and the red rock country as well. However, there is a reason that Idaho has been called the Gem State. It’s mountains are absolutely beautiful. We were lucky enough to spend three and a half weeks in Idaho our first summer on the road. That was absolutely amazing, but also spoiled us.
Our first camping place in Idaho was right next to the Big Wood River about 16 miles up 75 from Ketchum Idaho. It was just an area along the river with several camping spots. It wasn’t too far off the road, but just enough to be very pleasant. We were right next to the river so we could sit outside and listen and see and smell the river. It was glorious. I love the sound of a stream of water, especially at night as I am falling asleep.
There was a bike trail nearby that was perfect for an afternoon bike ride. There were roads that I could follow into the back country for my morning walks. It was absolutely idyllic. Except that we didn’t have internet, no cell signal. That was ok because it was during a quiet time for Mike and he didn’t need to work.
We were so happy to have my sister join us for several days at this location for a short summer vacation for her. She is a school teacher and had a rough year, like all teachers, because of COVID. She teaches Calculus and Statistics at my hometown high school. Teachers are my heros anyway, but with all the challenges of COVID, they are even more so. We don’t pay them enough in my opinion, because they impact they have is priceless. It was a nice relaxing time for her and we loved having her with us. The weather was absolutely perfect and the mountains were incredibly beautiful.
One day we went for a sightseeing drive up behind where we were camping. It wasn’t a long drive, but it was a beautiful drive. We climbed and climbed almost to the very top of the mountain. In fact, I thought the road might go up and over the pass ahead of us, but it didn’t it stopped right before. It appeared you could hike up and over the pass. But we headed back down.
Another day, we took another sightseeing drive up to Stanley, Idaho. Wow!!! That is one of the most beautiful drives I have been on. What amazing scenery. The Sawtooth Mountains are aptly named, because their jagged peaks look just like a saw. We enjoyed seeing the sights along the way that day. Galena Summit has an amazing overlook where you can look down into the valley (Sawtooth Basin) and see the jagged peaks of the Sawtooth surrounding the basin.
On the north side of the summit holds the birthplace of the Salmon River. It starts as a tiny stream–just a trickle. It was amazing because as we drove we saw the river grow from this tiny stream, to a gushing large river. It was incredible how quickly it grew in just a few miles. Even in a very dry, extreme drought conditions, the size of the Salmon is substantial by the time it reaches Stanley, Idaho, only about 30 miles from where it began.
Isn’t nature amazing!! Isn’t the World amazing!!! Isn’t its Creator amazing!! When I am out in nature, I always appreciate how much our Heavenly Father and Jesus love us because They created such a beautiful place for us to live. They didn’t have to do that, but They did. Praise be to God!!
At Stanley we turned around and headed back to our camp. We enjoyed our evenings relaxing by the river Or we played games–card games, bocce ball and other games. My sister loves to play games so we tend to play them when she comes to be with us.
The best was yet to come. I had wanted to do a Jeep drive that I had read about on a blog years ago that went into the mountains above Stanley. I felt bad about choosing to do it after we had just driven to Stanley the day before, because we had to retrace that same drive (twist our arms a little more). However, that drive I wanted to do was absolutely incredible. The beauty and history that we saw in that drive was phenomenal. I highly recommend it. Here’s a link to the blog article that inspired me to do it. Roads Less Traveled: Stanley Backroads. Below is a map of the drive we took.
The trail was a moderate 4 x 4 trail. Most of it was pretty easy, but there were a few sections that were a bit tougher. There are some very steep places and some very narrow places with drop offs on both sides and some areas where there is no room for passing if you happen to meet someone coming the other way. But we had no issues with it on this fine, dry summer day, although it did challenge our experience at times.
The beginning of this trail had a lot of history. First, we came upon the Sunbeam Dam. Apparently the mining company built a Dam on the river which actually turned the river into a lake at that point. The mining company went bust shortly after however, so the Dam was removed.
We then turned up the trail from highway 75 and it wound its way up Yankee Fork. This old mining area has some things preserved from its history, the coolest of which was the Dredge they used on the river. The mining company just left it there and the historical society operates it as a museum. There is also a couple of ghost towns well. It was very cool. We love history. The amazing thing about the dredge is that it would move up the Yankee Fork river and dredge out the whole river bed. That river isn’t that big. The dredge completely changed the face of the landscape around the river and completely changed the river itself. It was effective for mining, but devastating on the river flora and fauna. Even now, years later, the river has not recovered and there is a restoration project working on restoring the natural river and bringing back the fish. It’s amazing how shortsighted we sometimes are as humans when it comes to making a buck.
Then we drove on and started to climb and climb up several switch backs to gain a whole bunch of elevation. Then we dropped down into a narrow valley that was amazingly beautiful. We came upon the Diamond D Ranch which is a ranch you can stay at. It is in an incredibly beautiful setting. A great place to get away.
As we drove along we saw a bit of wildlife. We saw a mama deer and her fawn. We also saw some grouse in a tree right next to the road.
As we continued on we climbed again out of the valley and then we came upon some of the loveliest part of the trip. There had been a huge forest fire in the area several years before. We drove through the burned out area for much of the rest of the trip. But even in the destruction of a fire, nature restores itself and in this case in an extremely beautiful way. The fireweed flowers were all in bloom everywhere. It was such an overwhelmingly beautiful ride. At one point, I was absolutely giddy with the beauty of the fireweed.
We had learned about fireweed in Alaska in 2019. It grows all over up there. The reason it is called fireweed is because it is the first plant to grow after a forest fire. That was totally true in the burned out areas we drove through. I absolutely love fireweed. I probably took over 50 pictures and several videos of this area.
The burned out areas also had one other benefit. Waterfalls along the road that normally would have been mostly hidden by the trees were fully exposed and they were absolutely amazing. The wildflowers and greenery were in full bloom because they had access to the sun without the trees blocking it out. Nature has a way of cleaning up after herself and doesn’t she do beautiful work?
After such an amazingly beautiful area, we didn’t think things could get any better on this drive, and then they did. We arrived at a saddle and we could either take the road heading down the other side, or we could take the “road less traveled” that headed off in the direction of an old fire observation building at the very top of Pinyon Peak. It reminded me completely of the Road Not Taken by Robert Frost. So we headed up that road I had that poem going through my head–especially its iconic last three lines.
Two roads diverged in a wood, and Iā
Robert Frost
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
To our utter amazement, the road kept going up and up and up. We were able to drive all the way to the top of Pinyon Peak at 9947 feet in elevation. It was a bit nerve-wracking in some sections with how steep it was and how tight some of the corners were. (A few multi-point turns were needed). What an incredible view was our reward for the drive up that road. So COOOOOL!!!
This road is a bit of a lesson of life. While we were a bit nervous about taking the road and also a lot nervous at a couple of points along it, we kept going. Persevering to the top. Part of living life deliberately is being curious and letting your curiosity challenge you and take you to places you never would have gone if you sat comfortably back. Discovering and exploring is the thing that helps you figure out who you want to become. We love the mountains and we love off-roading. If we hadn’t been curious and tried it, we would never have seen this amazing view or experienced many more epic views in Beauty (our Jeep). More on that later, but back to the story.
The drive down the the other side of the saddle wasn’t difficult, it was just a little nerve-wracking as well. It was incredibly narrow with a drop off on one side and sometimes both. There was no way to pass anyone if you were to meet someone coming the other direction. One of you would have to back down the incredibly narrow road for quite a ways before passing could occur. Luckily we didn’t have anyone come the other direction. We made it down the other side and back to Stanley with no problem. Then the long, beautiful drive back to our camp on the Big Wood River. WOW–WHAT AN AMAZING DRIVE!!!
My sister stayed with us for one more day. It was interesting because when she left, the skies were relatively clear. She said, however, that she did not see a single mountain the whole drive back to Utah Valley because of the smoke in the air. The afternoon of the day she left, the smoke found us. In fact, there was a wild fire not far from us that had been set off by some lightning. The air got quite bad for a few days until they got the fire under control. It impacted us with smokey, hazy skies and bad air for the next few weeks. We had a lot of that all summer long. I believe it was a wonderful blessing–a tender mercy–that we had such lovely weather and amazing views for the time that my sister was with us and particularly for our amazing drive to the top of Pinyon Peak. She must be living right. š
Just one last thing, I just want to give a shout out to volunteers. People who volunteer their time for many different causes. On our last day together with my sister, we went to a viewpoint they call Billy’s Bridge where you can sometimes see the mountain goats off on the mountain peaks a fair distance away. There are viewing glasses and some educational exhibits about the goats. While were were there, a team of volunteers was replacing the exhibits with new signage. Shortly after we left there was a downpour of rain, so I’m sure they got soaked. I think it is so inspiring to see people volunteer. These were all retired forest service employees who continue to volunteer their time to help keep our forest great for all of us. A great big THANK YOU to them and all other volunteers. Without them our world would not be as nice a place.