Off the Beaten Path

Over the past several weeks, the family has been enjoying exploration of the mountains and foothills surrounding us. Two weeks ago, we explored (three days in a row!) the foothills north of Boise. It is a lot of fun traversing the 4 wheel drive roads that other vehicles can't access.


Some of the views of the city were awesome. It is amazing how there can be such low humidity yet the city looks to be covered in a haze.

Of course John had to climb even higher on Lucky Peak to get an even better view!

The really spectacular views came from looking northward into the snowcapped mountains of the Boise Mountain range. It still amazes us that it is nearly June and the mountain tops still have, and even receive snow!


On Memorial day, we took off to Silver City, Idaho. It is nestled in the Owyhee Mountains just south of Boise. On the map it looked closer than it was! We thought we were going for a picnic that would take us about an hour to reach. However, it took us nearly two hours- but, oh, the fun! The main roads to get to the city were great. When you got off the main road onto the road that takes you to Silver City, it was even pretty good. A nicely paved park-type road. However, about 6 miles into it, it became a very obvious, high-clearance 4x4 dirt road! We bounced and weaved our way the next 6-8 miles to the city. It was great!

The views on the way were great. You can see Hayden Peak in a lot of the photos. It's the taller of the snowcapped mountains in the distance. It stands at 8400+ feet. Oddly enough, we ambled our way back to those snowy mountains- at least near the one on the right. It stands very close to Silver City.


We took a detour on the way by taking a 4x4 trail out to an overlook. It was about a 500 foot gorge to a small stream. Beautiful views, indeed!


Now, Silver City is what folks refer to as a "ghost town." It was booming during the gold rush and had both a silver and a gold mine operating. Nowadays, there are still a few people who live there, but most of it is just empty buildings and historical stuff. When the gold ran out, so did the people, leaving everything behind as their memorial. (I took several photos of the town that you can see here).

When we got there, we had our picnic lunch and explored a bit. The boys mostly loved the mountain stream. So did John!


On our way out, we took some side roads and did more "off roading" as we explored the nature around us. Generally speaking, it was a lot of the same types of scenery- mountains, streams, gorges, snow... But it is something you can never seem to tire of!

Now, if you notice, from this viewpoint you can see from the Owyhee Mountains we are taking the photo from straight over the valley to the Boise Mountain Range. Yep, that's snow on top!


Well, hope you enjoyed! I know we did!

Steph