Canfield Mountain
Idaho Panhandle National Forest
The past weekend we ventured into the Idaho Panhandle National Forest and hiked up Canfield Mountain to the summit. In what I thought was going to be a 3.8 mile round trip easy hike, turned into one of the toughest hikes we have done to date. The first four miles we all uphill. It wasn’t that the grade of the uphill was too tough, it was that it was four miles of a constant climb. Along the way we ran into another hiker that was doing the trek solo. As we hiked along side this solo adventurer, we got to quiz her about her adventures. It never ceases to amaze me how adventurous some people are. This person was living solo, full-time in her van. She had been at it over a year and seemed to be relishing the adventure.
The younger generations are taking greater steps to define their happiness than we ever did. We had a preconceived definition of what we were supposed to do with our lives, and then set out to live it. The younger travelers have a completely different perspective and it seems to be working out well for them. If only we had the same adventurous spirit when we were younger, and had the same remote working opportunities that exist today, what would we have done? It is hard to say, but talking with this young person as we hiked the rigorous uphill torture, it was refreshing to hear that her experiences are so fulfilling.
Once we reached the summit we had a couple of choices for our decent. We could go back the way we came or we could take a much riskier trail and save some time. We chose to take the shorter of the two routes down the mountain. If you haven’t caught on yet, the shorter route would require us to traverse a much more technical decent. We had ascended four miles uphill and were now going to make the decent in about one and half miles. That means the decent was twice as steep as the accent. I can attest to the steepness with pictures of the cuts and bruises that I sustained from the three falls that I took, but this is a family channel! While this wasn’t the first time that I had received injuries while hiking, it was definitely the first time that I fell three times in the span of a mile and a half.
At the end of the day, the hike was worth the effort and the injuries. The difference between and adventure and an ordeal is matter of attitude. As long as we keep a great attitude, our age and abilities matter less than our desire to keep trying new things, and making new memories.
The video is the same one that can be found on our YouTube channel, but in the future, I will be posting exclusive content videos to Substack.
I hope you enjoy the video.