Spring Break in Hells Canyon

This year we chose the unusual spring break destination of Hells Canyon. Jeff has always wanted to go there. It is the deepest canyon in North America--yes, even deeper than the Grand Canyon. It was pretty unique scenery, and definitely a lot less crowded than the Grand Canyon, which was a big plus. Jeff likes taking these unusual kind of adventures, and usually we are happy to follow him. We were gone for three days and saw a lot of new country in western Idaho. We stayed each night at a nice hotel in Riggins and ventured out each day for our exploring. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate with us as well as we would have liked, but fortunately, we were able to do the hiking we wanted and see the sites we wanted to see.

Seth and Aubrey just outside of Riggins. The bridge marks the start of leaving
the Mountain time zone and entering the Pacific time zone.

The first day of our trip we hiked along the Rapid River, just south of
Riggins. Our hike got rained out on the first day of our trip, and we came 
back the last day to make another go of it.

This view of the Rapid River reminded us a lot of western
Oregon--lots of moss.

Family picture at the first bridge on our hike of the Rapid River.

On our second day we made the actual journey to Hells Canyon. This is a
scenic viewpoint before we headed down into the valley to Pittsburg
Landing and the heart of Hells Canyon. The Wallowa Mountains are 
in the background.

Pittsburg Landing--the only place on the Idaho side of Hells Canyon with
vehicle access to the river.

The Snake River flows through Hells Canyon.

We were surprised at how much cactus we encountered while hiking at
Hells Canyon. Many hillsides were covered with it--as we discovered when
we went exploring off trails. Ouch!

Seth and Aubrey were the family mountain goats as we went exploring
this hillside.

You can see the storm coming in. We experienced rain, snow, hail, and even
graupel on this hike. It was crazy weather!

Right behind our hotel must have been a fly fisherman's mecca. This area is
where the Little Salmon flows into the Big Salmon River. Every time we
looked out our hotel room window there were fishermen.

This is our hotel, looking up from the river. It was definitely the nicest place
in Riggins. We were surprised how small Riggins is--not population-wise,
but space-wise. The whole town is squished between two mountains and
is just a one-mile strip of town built between the mountains. It was
almost claustrophobic.

River rocks

Trailhead of our second try hiking the Rapid River, the last day of our adventure.
Fortunately, the weather was much better this day--we even had sunshine.
The second time we covered about 8 miles total.

It's a little bit hard to see the deer on the mountain, but that was as close
as they'd let Jeff get to take his picture. We saw lots of wildlife on this trip.

Stopping to observe the wildlife.

The Rapid River

We finally made it to the second bridge on the Rapid River. We turned around
just a little past this point.

At the end of our hike we finally spotted some yew trees. The second bridge
and the yew trees were our goals to see before we turned around and headed
back. The yew trees are significant because they are a type of tree that
usually don't grow in our climate--and aren't found in any other place in 
Idaho. But this little section of Idaho is a different kind of climate--a micro 
climate--and there are a few yew trees that grow there.