Most winters necessitate late-May to early-June starts for bagging some of these deep-in-the-forest peaks in Northern Idaho. Negotiating the mountains themselves generally isn’t too bad, but given the forest road conditions it’s just not possible to get close enough to access things, unless you’ve got a snow machine. My Honda Element doesn’t quite cut it.
This very mild winter we just had was absolute hell for the ski resorts, but it meant I could make some attempts on my W7I hitlist much earlier than normal.
The first one to fall was no-named hill 4634 outside of Elk River: W7I/NI-253. I tried for this one a couple of weeks prior, but about an hour into the drive and my 230k mile Honda began pitching a fit so I had to abort. Well, now that the SOTA-wagon is fixed up it was time to go for it again. Parking at the point where I could no longer drive, I hopped over the snow burm and my first dozen steps sank me mid-shin deep into crunchy snowice. That wasn’t going to work.
Lucky, I my trekking skis still up in the Yakima gear box. Slapping those things on, I easily made my way about a mile and half up the snow road to the base of the mountain. I jammed my skis into the snowbank, strapped on the microspikes and climbed up into the AZ.
Band conditions were not great. I spent about 90 minutes operating and only got 3 contacts before daylight and cold convinced me to head back down. So no, I didn’t get my hard-earned one point but I did activate the summit and to me, that was worth even more.
Back down to the skis, I glided (sorta, it was icy) back to the car and called it a success. Any day you get to goof around in the backcountry is a good one.
A couple of weekends later the temps were bumping even higher. It was Easter Sunday and there were two summits in relatively close proximity to eachother that I’ve been eyeballing for over a year. Unactivated and difficult to get to as they’re deep behind logging access gates, I had a full day’s worth of water and snacks packed expecting to log a shit ton of miles.
As I rolled up to the access road, my eyes widened as I recognized a wide-open gate–something I have never seen in the dozen or so times I’ve passed by this entrance. This was indeed going to be my day. I entered and happily, but cautiously, drove in towards the first summit.
I never did encounter another person or obstacle, though the driving was still slow and tough given the road conditions. Both of these summits were pretty straightforward ascents. Nothing too shwacky and just long enough to get a bit of a sweat on.
I grabbed 6 QSOs and then packed up determined to go nab the second one. Who knows if/when I’d ever be able to drive in this far, so today needed to be the day I go for both of these.
So after nothing in February, I bagged three FA’s in March plus a 6+3 pointer with Mount Spokane and the winter bonus. My CW is still rough but I’m loving it and it’s passable. On to April.