Gilmore Peak

It looked like the weather was going to be great for the upcoming weekend so I decided mid-week to make some plans. I invited my boys to come along but the eldest had to work on Saturday and the two youngest had football practice. They sadly declined and said perhaps next time! I saw the opportunity to get out by myself with no restrictions as to where to go and how long to stay. Cool!

Bell Mountain



No problem, I like to get out on my own, and do so about 30% of the time. I chose Gilmore Peak in the Lemhi Range of Idaho. I was somewhat familiar with the area, fairly close (by Idaho standards) and I have wanted to climb this one for years.

I got a few things done around the house Saturday AM and then loaded up and headed out just after noon. I had all afternoon to get up there, the weather was good, the tunes were good, and life was good!

Once past MudLake the traffic thinned (as if it was heavy before) and I set the cruise control at about 70 mph. I decided I had plenty of time to mess around so I checked out Skull Canyon and then the Charcoal Kilns – again. Pretty cool places. Pre-Historic Man had occupied this valley as far back as 10,000 years.
Skull Canyon was supposedly used by Native Americans for “burials”. I don’t know if that is true or not. I have heard that early settlers found skeletons in some of the many caves that are around here.

Charcoal Kilns - Sixteen kilns were built in 1866 to make charcoal for the smelter at Nicholia. Operations ceased in 1888 and the kilns were left to the elements. Over the years most of the kilns were torn down and the bricks used for other structures. Four kilns are still standing and some work has been done to preserve them.

Lemhi Range


I drive further up the valley enjoying the view, mountains on both sides towering into the evening sky. I find a place about a quarter mile off the main road and settle in for the night. I spent the rest of the evening taking time exposures of the night sky – very clear here, and watching a DVD of Lewis and Clark. Kind of cool that they crossed the continental divide just a few miles from where I was.

Milky Way


The next morning I wake early and drive the few miles to the trail head. Located at the Meadow Lake Campground I find everyone still asleep. Very quietly I check my daypack for all necessary goods and head up the trail. A very peaceful morning it is and a promise of a great day ahead.

The trail is easy to follow and I soon find myself at the Lemhi Divide, elevation 10,200 feet. The trail forks here, straight over the saddle and down into upper Mill Creek, to the right which will take you to the top of Portland Mountain, or to the left up a ridge that curves around to the east. This is the path I follow. I look ahead and the terrain looks very rugged. I have some doubts but keep on heading up. There were some obstacles, but nothing all that serious. It looked way worse than it really was. I wouldn’t get grandma up there but any serious scrambler will have no trouble reaching the top.

Looking South towards Bell and Diamond....


Now as I am eating my lunch I look down the ridge leading to the east. It looks shorter than going back the way I came. I debate with myself for a few minutes whether to try it or not, and then decide to give it a go.

I shouldn’t have listened. I should have gone back the same way. But no, I wanted to explore a new route. There is a reason why no one goes this way. No Easy Way Off in this direction. I should have slapped myself silly..... The last half mile was a bear. Very steep and very loose rock. Left some skin on this peak I did! I made such a racket coming down through the rock that I was sure that everyone in the campground below must surely be looking up wondering what the heck was going on. Well after much thrashing around I finally make it down to less steep terrain. Twenty minutes later I find myself crossing the lake’s outlet on some logs and then I walk up the lake shore where I find a guy sitting in a lawn chair with a fishing pole in hand. I asked him how the fishing was, he said so-so. He asked me what I was doing and when I told him he said “No kidding? That's pretty crazy!” I asked “Did you not hear me coming off the top?” He said he didn’t hear a thing. That was fine with me. No one heard the ruckus. I was back at my outfit in a couple of minutes where my cold beverage and sandwich were waiting.



On the way back down the road I stopped and checked out some of the old cabins at Gilmore. One in particular we call the Rat Palace. Used to stay in it when I was much younger – with the rats. It is still standing after close to a hundred years – cool. The rest of the drive home was uneventful. That was OK. I already had enough excitement for one day!

My story? Stop me before it gets too boring......

I have been putting together a written history of my life, before I get senile and forget everything. Everyone should do this.

Just bits an' pieces....

I was born in Idaho Falls. 1955. Seems a long time ago now. Earliest memories were of traveling. A lot.

Early 60’s - Salt Lake City Utah, Des Moines Iowa, Birmingham Alabama, Farmington New Mexico, Truckee and Bakersfield California. There are more places but my memory has been blurred from all the years gone by.

Next, father took a job with MK and the Minutemen Missile silos on the plains east of Rapid City. Father divorced Mother at this time. She stayed in SD and he took a position in the Netherlands. I am shuffled back and forth, Dad, Mom, Dad, Mom…..I cross the Atlantic more times than I can remember, a seasoned traveler at an early age. Holland……I remember listening to Radio Veronica, Bus Stop by the Hollies in particular, playing while the construction workers played soccer in the street below our apartment at noon.

I attend school in the Netherlands, and spend my summers in Idaho with grandpa and grandma. Strict schooling for most of the year and then almost total freedom for 3 months. In Holland I was viewed as the heathen from the Wild West, in Idaho I was the flatlander who was way too cultured.

Holland was green. It was, for lack of a better word, tidy. Small, well kept lawns. Fences painted. People had manners. You were required to use them.

Father married a Dutch girl, Wilhemina Relena Pietersma. Blond. We lived in den Hague, Staaphorst, Meppel, Assen and then Ommen.

Her parents! Oupa en Oma.



Two week in Spain. Beaches. Hot sand. Gibraltar. I saw Africa from there. The road to Rhonda…..amazing!

London, all the time. Belgium to Luxumburg… through the Ardennes and the site(s) of the Battle of the Bulge. Amsterdam now and again. Flew home via Iceland.

My times in Idaho were days made in heaven. Splitting wood, bucking hay, moving sprinkler pipe. It was not all work, there were days of exploration. Days of adventure. Built a tree house out over the Snake River. Climbed every hill within five miles of home, Rode bikes down the steepest of paved roads, on the handlebars. Forded the Snake. Fished every evening. Picnics. Target practice with the bow. BB Gun wars. Learned about gun safety the hard way. Learned to swim. Like a fish.

It was a mile to the small store. I would walk it looking for pop bottles. Always found enough to trade in and buy a soda and a candy bar, and still have change.

Live with my mother for a while in South Dakota. She rented a place not far from Mt Rushmore, very cool. Secluded, quiet, beautiful. I love the Black Hills.

Back to the Netherlands for a school year and then the summer in Idaho again. Moved to Bangkok. Not in Kansas anymore……Laos, Malaysia, Singapore. A two year adventure. The war was still raging in Vietnam. Klongs and open markets. Sukhumvit Highway. Pattaya before it became notorious. Snakes and lizards….. everywhere.

Flew back to Holland, brief stops in Karachi, Beirut, Rome.

Holland for a few more years. Had a good friend who was a diplomat’s son. We traveled to Germany many, many times to stay at his parents place. Train ride there and back an adventure all its own. Dusseldorf. Koln (Cologne) Bonn. Saw and explored (among many) the Drachenfels castle "Dragon's Rock", in the Siebengebirge mountain. A legend recounts that Siegfried – the hero of the Nibelungenlied – killed a dragon living in a cave in the mountain, then bathed in its blood to became invulnerable. Hence, the mountain is named the "Dragon's Rock" -- Drachenfels.

Backpacked from Bonn to Trier. Spent 2 weeks in Norway with my father. The trip through Germany and Denmark fascinating. The coast around Hirtshals seemed remote and smelled of fish. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon while we were on the ferry across the Skagerrak. Watched McKennas Gold in a theatre in Kristiandsand.



Eventually made it back to Idaho, completing trip around the world that took years. All this before my 17th birthday.

Then several years of odd jobs and good times in Idaho. Backpacked and hiked most of the state. Floated the rivers before it became commercial. Hitchhiked to Seattle, found a construction job and worked all over the state. Good Times!

Traveled to Texas and roofed houses for a while. Hot, and though I could handle it, I missed the mountains. Decided Texas wasn’t for me. Gotta be honest here. I hate Texas.

Back to Idaho for a short while.

Got a job offer in Johannesburg. Off on another adventure. Met my future wife the first day I was there. The four years I lived in SA were the best years of my life. We both made good money. Lived modestly. And traveled. Got out into the bundu. Met real Africans. Climbed several times in the Drakensberg. Sani Pass. Tugela Falls, the 2nd highest on the planet. We spent weeks on the wild coast. Eastern Transvaal.....what a place. Sudwalla and Sterkfontein Caves. Lisbon Falls and countless others . Threw 100’s of pounds of candy to the native children. Bought their crude works of art.







Brought my bride home to Idaho. She cried for a week. “What have I done?” she thought to herself. 5 cents a second for her to call home at the time. And she did….$$$$$.

She fits right in now. Became a US citizen. She travels home every few years, and we try to send one of the children to go along each time. Eight weeks or so on a vacation! I mostly stay home, and that’s OK. Got my climbing and snowboarding to occupy my time.

Speaking of which....lots of snowboarding and climbing to be had here in Idaho. Not so fond of many of the people here, very narrow minded, and somewhat backwards, but mostly just narrow minded. Doesn't mean there aren't some really great people here, it's just that they are few and far in between.

There is more, and I will continue to add to it as time allows.

Now this boring tale doesn't include my drug smuggling and life of crime, I will leave that for those to read...... after I am dead!

Deadman Peak / Lookout

A business associate dropped by my office a few weeks ago. Just one of those "We want to do some more business and how soon can we get something going?" type visits. During the short meeting I got up rather stiffly, and walked over to the copy machine. He commented on my awkward movements and asked if I had been to the gym. I told him I had been climbing, he said "Really?, Where?" I told him I had been on a few short trips into the Wyoming Range, and loved the area. He then startled me by saying that as a very young man he had spent some time there, more specifically, in the Deadman Canyon locale.



As a young man (he is now close to 70) his father would take him up to this area to load coal into their small truck. This was around 1955 and there were several coal mines in operation way up in the high places of this mountainous area. The mine they used the most was called the Blind Bull. To get to it they had to pass the Vail Mine, now known as the Deadman Mine.......



We go back to February 1938. Five miners are wintering over in this remote spot high in the mountains. They are working the mine to stockpile coal to be sold and hauled out the next summer. Carrie Baker, the wife and mother to two of the miners also worked as a cook for all the men.



Carrie was busy making dinner for the men when she heard an explosion. Not unusual for the type of work they were involved in. Not long afterwards Henry Ash stumbled through the door. "There has been a terrible accident, an explosion in the mine" he gasped. Through clenched teeth he told Carrie she would have to use the old set of cross country skis and ski six miles down the canyon to get help.



Now the Young family had homesteaded an area on the Grays River in the 1920's. Sam, his wife and two sons were asleep in their small cabin. Sam awoke to the sound of his dog barking and he leaned up on an elbow to listen closer. He could hear the sound of another dog barking, so he arose, dressed and went outside into the frigid air. He followed the sound of the barking dog and soon saw it and knew the dog came from the mines up the canyon. The dog lead him to a shape laying on the ground. It was Carrie, exhausted and crying. She had given up. Sam brought her down to the cabin, warmed her up and she was then able to tell what had happened.

Sam and his son Rex donned winter gear and skied the six long miles up to the mine that night. They found Henry Ash in the cabin, dead. The four other miners they found in the mineshaft, also dead.



It was determined that coal dust in the shaft from previous blasts had ignited when they set off the last blast of the day. It blew two mine cars clear across the canyon. The four miners inside the mine, John and Bill Baker, Denver Holbrook, and Rulon Ivie were killed instantly. Henry Ash, who was was outside the mine, died from his injuries when the tipple collapsed on him.

The Lincoln County highway crews, assisted by Civilian Conservation Corps workers, cleared seven feet of snow from 30 miles of the Grays River road and the six miles of access road up to the mine. Four of the bodies were sent home to North Carolina. Rulon Ivie was buried in Utah. Carrie Baker recovered and returned to the East, grateful to the Young family and her shaggy black dog that she had not perished as well.

I accidentally found out about (through the Ranger Station in Afton Wyoming) and tracked down the Grandson of Sam Young. To my great surprise, I learned that he lived only a couple miles from me. I called him up and talked at length about this area and it's history.



The Mine, Canyon and the Mountain are now known by the name "Deadman". Deadman Mountain was used for a fire lookout from the 1930's to the late 60's. It still sits atop this remote peak. It is no wonder it was put here, the surrounding views are outstanding. The Salt River Range, the entire length of the Wind River Range, along with the Tetons and parts of the Gros Ventre can be seen, not to mention the surrounding mountains like Hoback and McDougal.


Trenton, Tate and I climbed this peak in the summer of 2007! Nice trip, well worth the effort to get there!