We woke up to another beautiful morning and before breakfast, I was out shooting some scenes around the ranch. See John’s full trip report here: http://www.splattski.com/2020/three_blaze/index.html Read a comprehensive history of the area with the Tims book Merciless Eden: https://www.amazon.com/Merciless-Eden-wilderness-homestead-beautiful/dp/0989191001 I also wanted to point you in the direction of the Idaho Trails Association. The ITA and its director Jeff Halligen do an incredible job of preserving and maintaining our Idaho Trails. Please visit their web site and make a donation if you can. https://www.facebook.com/IdahoTrailsAssociation/ https://www.idahotrailsassociation.org
The Tims have done a wonderful job of preserving some of the historical items found around the area.
A daytime view of the barn.
River was down early this morning patiently waiting for us to get ready.
First job of the day was a tour of the actual ferry location on the Salmon River. Doug gave us a tour of the area and provided us detailed information about the crossing.
This is the artsie image without John and Arthur.
Since we were fairly confident we had found most of the original trail route yesterday, we were off to another drainage in an effort to find an abandon reroute of the original trail. Art had studied old trail maps and was working on a theory that the first “improvement” to the original route went up Little Trout Creek. John assigned Art as the crew leader for the day which immediately put him in a position to criticize our leadership….. Something Art and I had done to him the entire day before……. Job one was to rename Little Trout Creek, Little Troutner Creek!
We followed good trail tread a long way up Little Troutner Creek. We stoped for flower pictures and after a while, River came back wondering about the delay.
If you are getting tired of wildflower pictures, you better click off this page now.
River and I are watching John and Art work their way back down this ridge.
We were able to confirm that indeed there was good evidence that a trail had gone up Little Trout Creek, cut to the ridge, and then worked its way up to the present location of the modern trail. Reluctantly, John and I agreed with Art’s reroute hypothesis. This section of the trail was likely used from the early 1900’s to about 1960 when the new and current trail was constructed. This image of Art is a tribute to his stelar leadership on Day 2.
Don’t forget to check back in soon for the exciting conclusion to our Campbell’s Ferry Expedition!
davefaitlemonde.com 