The North Fork of the Coeur d' Alene River

Holy crap Batman. I have had a wild week. It is official...I FINALLY graduated. Ok, it is not totally official until I complete 6 months of internships which will be over the 14th of December, but the big hoop has been jumped. It was most cool to wear that funky master's hood, too. Now of course I want one of those puffy Ph. D. hats. My parents came for graduation and stayed for almost a week. After they left Wally and I took off. I borrowed Nancy's Suburban, loaded it full of camping crap and headed east into Idaho to the Coeur d' Alene River valley. And it is only a couple of hours from my house!!!!!

We had the most wonderful three days on the North Fork of the Coeur d' Alene River. I had only been there once and it was just a few months after Morgan died so I only remember that I was there. I remember stopping at this little tavern and having a beer and french fries but I could not find it again and for all I know it could have been in Iowa and not Idaho.

Anyway, there is a road that goes up the river about 50 miles and there are skads of places to camp. We stayed in the Big Hank campground which is the farthest one up the river. I drove through the other ones and Big Hank seemed to have the quietest and most private spots. It is right on the river and our camping spot was up the bank just a bit so I fell asleep each night to the sound of the water. I saw elk and deer in the campground and a moose and another elk on the way there. That was a cool treat.

Walter and I got there early Wednesday afternoon and just hung out at the campground and goofed around in the river. There were very few people in the campground and it was totally quiet at night. The next morning we took off for a couple of small hikes. We went to the Settler's Grover interpretative trail which is way the hell down a one lane dirt road. The interpretive trail part is only about a half mile long but the entire trail heads over the Bitterroot Divide and into Montana. I had no desire to hike that far, but wanted to put in at least 5 miles up to an old mining area.

The first part of the trail through the really big cedar trees is unbelievable. The trees are so huge and old. It floors me to think that they were big trees when that Columbus guy got here. The something or other fork of Eagle Creek runs through it and the whole place is totally ethereal. My pictures do not do justice to the size of the trees and the deep green under the forest canopy. After the interpretive trail ends the trail continues along the creek but up a bit on the hillside. Eventually after about another mile or so it crosses the creek and goes along the other side. This is where we turned back. The trail crews had evidently not made it there to clean up the blow downs from the winter. We kept having to climb over downed trees and I finally got to one that would have removed bits of flesh from me had I tried to go over it (and around it was out of the question given the steep slope). So we ambled back to the trailhead and headed to Shadow and Fern Falls.

The waterfalls we went to see are pretty cool. They are 12 and 24 feet high and you can walk behind both of them. The folks at http://www.wildernesstrip.com/ say that it is around 2 miles round trip to see both falls but I don't think it is that far. The drive there takes longer than the walk and is pretty impressive in itself. I am glad I did not try it in the Festiva though it might have been an advantage on those narrow mountain roads.

It was really dark in the forest when we got there and my pictures are not too hot. It is hard to tell how high the waterfalls are but it is still cool (and if you want to see some good pictures go to the wildernesstrip link and click on hiking...there are some nice pictures of the falls). After checking out the falls Walter and I went back to the campground and played around in the river for a while. I got totally soaked and it felt pretty darn good. We observed the summer solstice with a nice fire late into the night.

The next morning, Friday, we packed up our stuff and drove farther north along the river to the Coeur d' Alene River Trail which I believe is a national scenic trail. What an incredible hike. The trail goes seven miles to Jordon Camp and then continues on from there. I decided that we would hike for an hour and a half and then turn around and hike back. In all, we did about 6-7 miles of one of the most beautiful trials I have ever been on.

The trail leaves the road and follows the river mostly on bluffs and slopes above it. There is a really large meadow in the first half mile and we saw elk poo and moose tracks in the trail. Then the trail heads uphill for a ways and ends up at a bend and an incredible viewpoint. Walter and I took a wee break there (it is mostly in the hot sun to that point) and saw that someone had screwed a memorial plaque to a tree. It made me cry. Then we ambled up the trail for another mile or so. I am glad I turned around when I did because by the time I got back to the trailhead I was mighty tired. I do not have my trail legs yet and I could tell that even Walter was exhausted. He slept all the way home.

I want to go back up there again this summer. The whole area is so beautiful and there are lots of trails. I sort of like the base camping/day hiking thing. And it was nice to be driving a vehicle that I did not have to worry about and that could handle the rough forest service roads. The campground host (who is my new friend) told me that so far Big Hank does not fill on the weekends but if I get there and there is no place to put up my tent I can put it up behind his trailer. I, in turn, will help him out when he gets a shoulder replacement this fall (though unofficially since I do not have a license as of yet). Sounds like a damn good trade to me!!!!

Here are the pictures (and yeah, ignore the date on the photos, I borrowed a camera too and did not realize the date thing was on and was wrong: My little Walter; 2-4 from the trail; 5 the totally lush vegetation along the trail; more trees; Walter next to a root ball from a tree that had fallen over...it was damn huge!!!; a view from the road towards the Bitterroot Divide (I think this side of the river is technically the Bitterroots and the other side is the Cabinet Mountains but I am not sure); Shadow Falls (we had to climb over a big tree in the trail on this one too); our little campsite along the river at Big Hank; the river right behind where the tent is located; the meadow across the road that is open for free camping (without a pit toilet); cooking dinner on the stove that my parents bought the year before I was born (yeah, that stove would be 43 years old); pictures along the river trail...and yeah, I don't know why there are big spaces between the pictures... sometimes html on this thing pisses me off).