Mount Borah

My dad and I climbed Mount Borah on September 27th. He turned 55 this year and his goal was to climb the tallest mountain in Idaho. Some guys buy a convertible for a mid-life crisis, but my dad wanted to cause himself immense pain and suffering.

It was the last nice Saturday before all the storms and snow started coming in. The trail is 3.5 miles long and you climb over 5,100 feet, that is about a mile up. The average grade is almost 30%. It was a grunt taking us almost 11 hours total. It is the steepest hike I have ever been on, and the most challenging that I have done. There is a part called "Chicken-Out Ridge", where the trail gets a little tricky. You basically have to scramble, walk/crawl on your hands and feet for almost a half mile. There are some intimidating ledges that look scary as you scramble next to them. The comforting thought is that there have only been two recorded deaths on the mountain, and they were people that fell/slipped on snow. Honestly, the ridge wasn't that challenging physically, but it was a mental challenge. We took it slow and steady, and there were other hikers out that we could see where they went. The trail was a grunt in parts and your muscles burned on the way up, and your joints ached on the way down.

Overall a great experience! Would I do it again? Maybe when I am 55.

Scott


This is about a mile into the trip. You can tell it is Idaho with the sparse trees and rugged mountains. This dead tree was picturesque.

This is about two miles in and we had climbed almost 3000 feet, notice how the trail follows the ridge line. Dad wouldn't even look over ledge--he didn't want to 'chicken out' before we arrived at Chicken-Out Ridge.

This is the same stop, but we are looking up at Borah behind me. The air is so light up there that I couldn't keep my arms down. :)

This is our view of Chicken-Out Ridge, see how the trail still follows the ridge line. Where the color changes to yellow is the official starting point of Chicken-Out. We saw our fair share of hikers that stopped and waited for their buddies, or others that stopped and just went right back down the mountain.

This was the worst part. My finger is pointing to the little notch that we scrambled to get thru. What you can't see is the 'imminent death ledge' that looms to the left or the 'less steep but still pucker-worthy ledge' to the right.

This is a picture of Dad showing the 'big gun' he brought to keep the bears away. We are at the top of Borah here. The temperature was in the upper 50's with a mild breeze. As you can tell we felt great making it to the top before sunset.

There was a U.S.A. flag along with an Idaho flag that was hanging upside down(I guess altitude sickness makes you do funny things). We signed the log book, had a sandwich, called the girls with my cellphone. Surprisingly the signal wasn't great--I had to stand on the north part of the peak and face west or I lost the call. Some other hikers brought a few cans of Budweiser--that didn't seem like the smartest thing to do heading down the mountain. Yes, I had to work hard to keep my arms down.

This is one of the tricky parts of Chicken-Out Ridge. You climb about 20 feet straight up and then head down about 80 feet off to the right. Then we scrambled along a 'snow field', which was a side-hill trail that was in the shade and had snow from the past week. Notice the light air lifting Dad's arms up again.

Here is Dad on the way down. This is about 1000 feet down from the peak, and it was steep shale that would make you slide down almost just as much as you would step up. It was a grunt going up, but on the way down it was a 'controlled slide.' You can see the winding stream at the bottom, that is where our car was at.

Here is Dad and I at the top of Mount Borah. 12,662 feet up and the tallest peak in Idaho. Not bad for a 55 year old and his 30 year old son.