A good portion of the last few months have been spent attempting to fill our freezer with fish, restocking the wood pile for winter, and getting the garden going. June has brought both snowstorms and 90 degree temps. After all that we headed up into the headwaters of the Clearwater for a few days of backpacking up Kelly Creek.
Spring is definitely springing in north central Idaho. Wildflowers are blooming and things are coming alive out in the woods. I’m thinking spring is the new summer when it comes to backpacking. No hundred degree days, no wildfire smoke, less crowds. Of course the high country is still under snow, so we kept it close to home for this one and headed to the Selway River for a low elevation spring backpack.
Now that spring has sprung, we have our eye out for any weather windows to get out on the trails with a backpack (or hook the boat up and go fishing, or …well you get the idea). One such window opened at the end of March and we jumped right on it and packed for a couple nights in Hells Canyon. Besides being the deepest gorge in North America it is also intolerably hot in the summer, so it made for a good first overnight hike of 2026 before things get too hot there. We headed to Pittsburg Landing and headed up the Snake River from there.
