Idaho

After leaving Glacier National Park, I made my west to Logan State Park located in the Thompson Lakes region of Montana for a relaxing Labor Day. My plan calls for me to traverse the length of the state of Idaho, north to south, in order to reach Utah where I plan to visit all five of the national parks in that state throughout the fall.

Heyburn State Park

Located about 20 miles south of Coeur d’Alenes, Idaho is the 5,744-acre Heyburn State Park. Founded in 1908, it is the oldest state park in the Pacific Northwest and features towering Ponderosa pines, abundant bird life, and three lakes: Chatcolet, Benewah and Hidden. I stayed at the very peaceful Benewah Campground that that sits above the lake of the same name.

My campground had a great walking trail that led around the lake where you could bird watch the numerous waterfowl that were on the lake including white pelicans which were probably stopping over from their summer nesting sites in the Great Plains. If you follow the trail to its termination, then you come to railroad tracks which to the south cross the lake on an old trestle and to the north enter a tunnel built in 1940. The tracks are used by the St. Maries River Railroad which runs lumber products from the mills in the north.

Hiking on the tracks through the tunnel you encounter beautiful marshes and meadows which are obvious moose habitat, but I didn’t see any myself. There are several large sidings along the main line which are overgrown and obviously not in use today. On a hike about a mile north of the tunnel, I heard a train approaching and sure enough two locomotives were pulling a load of lumber products. The engineer treated me to a couple quick bursts from his horn as I watched from the siding.

I also walked on the trestle that crosses the lake, but I only went about a third of the way as I didn’t want to get caught out there with a train approaching. The trestle seems to be a popular fishing spot based on all the tackle hanging from the old telephone wires. Atop several of the telephone poles I could see several large nests built out of sticks. They looked too small to be eagle nests and they must be osprey nests because I did observe several ospreys fishing and soaring over the lake.

McCall, Idaho

My second stop in Idaho was to the town of McCall which is about 100 miles north of Boise. Originally founded as a logging town, today McCall is a vibrant resort community that sits on the southern shore of Payette Lake with towering pine-covered peaks surrounding it on all sides. The lake is popular with boaters while the surrounding area has numerous hiking and biking trails as well as skiing in the winter months. McCall sits at 5,021 feet in elevation and about 3,100 permanent residents call it home.

Located just north of town on a peninsula surrounded by Payette Lake is the 1,515-acre Ponderosa State Park. The park is nestled in the shade of towering Ponderosa pines and has miles of wonderful hiking trails through the forest, along the lakeshore, and past marshes. I visited the state park several times and hiked many of the trails. Unfortunately, the spectacular views I’ve seen in photos weren’t visible due to the thick smoke from numerous wildfires in the region.

For thousands of years, Chinook salmon have spent their adult lives in the Pacific Ocean and then swam up the rivers of the Pacific Northwest to spawn, then die, in the rivers of their birth. The damming of key rivers like the Columbia, Snake, and Salmon disrupted the migratory spawning of the Chinook salmon. Many of the dams added fish ladders to help the salmon reach their spawning streams, but their numbers continued to decline. In an effort to boost the Chinook salmon populations, Fish & Game authorities began intercepting the adults swimming up the rivers and collecting their fertilized eggs. The McCall Fish Hatchery incubates those eggs and then raises the young salmon until they are big enough to be placed in the streams so they can make their way to the ocean.

Twin Falls, Idaho

Twin Falls is a city of about 55,000 residents in southern Idaho.

The Perrine Bridge is a steel-arched bridge that was completed in 1976 and is often referred to as the “Gateway to Twin Falls”. The bridge spans 1,500 feet across the Snake River Canyon and is 486 feet above the churning river below. At the southern end of the bridge is a visitor center and park where you can get spectacular views of this beautiful structure. The Perrine Bridge is also a very popular location for BASE jumpers (skydiving off a static structure) and thrill seekers come from all over the world to jump off this bridge year-round without a permit.

Often referred to as “the Niagara of the West”, the Shoshone Falls are 950 feet wide and here the Snake River drops 212 feet into deep pools below. The Snake River flows through one of the largest volcanic plains in the world. Extending some 400 miles from the border of Idaho and Wyoming through Twin Falls, this lava flow is about 5,000 feet thick and lava last flowed about 2,000 years ago in this region. The canyon began to be carved as the Snake River flowed west from its origins in the Jackson Hole valley. Over a million years ago, the gigantic Bonneville Lake covered most of southern Idaho, northeast Neveda, and Utah. Then about 11,000 years ago, the natural dam forming this lake failed and all the water drained out in an event known as the Bonneville Flood which lasted for months. Huge walls of water crashed down the Snake River and contributed to the creation of the canyon as well as the formation of the Shoshone Falls. In the 1920s, a small dam was built to divert water to a hydroelectric powerhouse which provides power for 9,000 homes in Twin Falls today.

On September 8, 1974, the world-famous daredevil Evel Knievel attempted to jump the Snake River Canyon in a steam-powered rocket. In front of a live audience of some 30,000 and world-wide live television audience of millions, Knievel was lowered into the cockpit of his rocket which rested on a steel ramp at about 3:30pm. The rocket launched Evel at about 300 mph skyward over the southern rim of the canyon and immediately the parachute pre-maturely deployed ending the flight about halfway over the canyon. Evel drifted down into the canyon and landed in the Snake River where he was rescued by safety crews. His nose was broken and his reputation took a severe hit as many said the stunt was just a scam. Today, the dirt mound which the launch ramp was constructed on is still there along with a plaque and remains a popular tourist site even fifty years later.

Minidoka National Historic Site

On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 excluding some 120,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast. Two-thirds of them were United States citizens. Despite never being charged with a crime, Japanese Americans from Alaska, Washington, and Oregon were forcibly removed from their homes and businesses, and sent to Minidoka Relocation Center near Hunt, Idaho. They arrived by train to a desolate camp surrounded by barbed wire and guard towers with only the possessions they could carry.

The Minidoka Relocation Center was a 33,000-acre site, but most of the 640 buildings were packed into 946 acres. Throughout the war, over 13,000 incarcerated people passed through the security gates at Minidoka. The peak population of 9,397 on March 1, 1943 made the center the seventh-largest city in Idaho. Incarcerees were grouped into 36 residential blocks each consisting of 12 barracks as well as a mess hall, recreation hall, and a central H-shaped building with bathrooms, showers, and a laundry. A barrack was a tarpaper-and-wood building (no insulation) consisting of six one-room apartments. Each apartment was to be shared by an entire family with the only furnishings being a potbelly stove and cots. The bathrooms and shower facilities were open lacking any kind of privacy. All meals had to be eaten in the central mess hall which further broke the traditional Japanese family unit.

Upon arriving at Minidoka Relocation Center, the Japanese Americans did not complain and ponder the injustice they had suffered. Instead, they set to the work of making their “prison” into a thriving community. Carpenters built furniture for the apartments from crates and pallet wood. They improved the infostructure by converting some of the barrack buildings into schools and hospitals as well as fixing the horrible sanitation conditions. Since they were mostly confined to the camp, they opened a movie theater, erected dance halls, and founded scouting troops for both boys and girls. My favorite story was how the children began clearing a field of rocks and sagebrush to form a baseball diamond under the watch of armed guards. Soon the entire community joined in to complete the diamond and organize baseball leagues. The Minidoka incarcerees also took to the task of reclaiming the desert and converting it to fertile farmland. In 1943 alone, they produced 979,770 pounds of potatoes, 79,325 pounds of carrots, and 101,814 pounds of cabbage. Not only did Minidoka become self-sufficient, but they also produced enough to be shipped to other relocation camps.

On February 1, 1943, President Roosevelt activated the 442^nd Regimental Combat Team which consisted entirely of segregated Japanese American troops. Together with the 100^th Infantry Battalion of Hawaii, they were the most decorated regiment in United States history with 18,143 individual commendations and 9,486 casualties. The Honor Roll posted at the entrance to the Minidoka Relocation Camp lists the names of the 950 Minidoka incarcerees who honorably served their country in World War II. Of those from the camp that served, 72 gave their lives in defense of a country that wrongfully incarcerated them.

I really enjoyed my visit to the Minidoka Relocation Center not just for the history I learned, but also to celebrate the remarkable sacrifice and resiliency of the Americans who lived there.

Massacre Rocks State Park

Located along the banks of the Snake River near American Falls, Idaho is Massacre Rocks State Park. Back in the 19^th century, emigrants traveling west along the Oregon and California Trails passed through and camped at this site. In 1862, a wagon train passing through here was ambushed by a band of Shoshone warriors that left some in the party dead. The name Massacre Rocks is derived from that event as well as the numerous large boulders scattered over the landscape. The state park is rich with a geological history and volcanic evidence of an ancient lava flow are everywhere.

The landscape is covered with volcanic rock and the ground is a coarse black sand. Throughout the park are these unusual rock formations sticking out of the ground like small columns. Geologist believe they were created when steam rich with minerals rose up through cracks in the lava flow. As the steam reached the surface, it hardened and this rock is much harder than the volcanic rock so it has survived erosion over the centuries. Devil’s Garden near my campsite at Massacre Rocks State Park was a prime example of this odd rock formations. Just like at Twin Falls, here the Snake River erodes away the soft volcanic rock to form a small canyon and my campsite overlooked this scene. There is a gap in the cliffs opposite the park which was caused by an ancient waterfall during the time of the Bonneville Flood.

The enormous polished boulders scattered throughout the park were displaced some 11,000 years ago when ancient Bonneville Lake drained in a massive flood. The remnant of that ancient lake is the Great Salt Lake. Emigrants who were passing through the region on the Oregon Trail would often inscribe their names of these rocks. I visited the nearby Register Rock historic site which preserves some of these inscriptions. There were several names dated 1849 which most likely were men heading to the California Gold Rush. There were also many names that were dated 1862 which was a busy time on the Oregon Trail. A young seven-year-old boy by the name of JJ Hansen carved images of an Indian and preacher on a rock back in 1866 when he passed through with his family on their way to Oregon. He later became a sculptor and returned in 1908 to inspect his childhood work and add his name.