Mickinnick Trail
Probably the quickest way into Forest Service land in Sandpoint is the Mickinnick Trail. I hiked a portion last winter shortly after the first snow and returned in the midst of the summer-like heat last week.
It is a seven mile roundtrip hike which consists of a continuous set of switchbacks up the mountain. In many places it is rocky as it winds up the mountainside. In my current condition I found it fairly strenuous. When I ventured out in the heat of about 85F (30C) I had just received my Atlas Adventure pack for carrying photography gear. I loaded it with a fair amount of gear and a tripod and 2 liters of water as I wanted to try it out and see how well it worked. Mickinnick seemed like a good test ground.
Well the day was too hot for strenuous activity I don’t do well in the heat on the best of days and as I ascended I walked slowly and sipped water frequently to stay out of trouble. I found the pack extremely comfortable but after a mile or so got quite hot and rested. Thunderstorms were blowing up from the south so I waited until I had cloud cover before going a bit further. I decided at that point to turn back before I got into any more trouble. The increasing cloud cover improved the heat measurably and I got down feeling hot but pretty good all considering. The pack was comfortable and I was hardly aware of it.
Two days later I decided to go again. The weather was much cooler in the forties (8C) with light rain, mist, fog, and low hanging cloud. These conditions were much more to my liking for a strenuous hike. This day I made a rapid pace up the mountain, again with my camera pack. The aspect of the scenery and conditions could not have been more different, which was my primary motivation for a second hike.
I have written in the past about the challenges of photographing in this area. I suppose it is inevitable that one finds new geography a challenge at first. This is of course part of the desire to see new places beyond the novelty of the experience. There is a challenge to find the uniquely beautiful and sublime and express it in an image.
To be sure Northern Idaho is an intrinsically beautiful wild country with pine forests, lake and impressive mountain ranges. But there is lot of work required to express this from a unique perspective. Take for instance trees. A couple of years ago I made a photobook called ‘Three Wood Lands’ with images I found in three Cambridgeshire forests. They deciduous forests and as such there is an astonishing array of form, texture and color.
Here however it is predominantly coniferous with some aspen, cottonwood, willow, and vine maple. Conifer forests have a kind of uniformity to them. While beautiful they are also dense and dark. On the mountainsides there are frequently broken down snags with tufts of Spanish moss. Right now I find that unattractive. Such is the challenge. I tend to shoot a lot of intimate landscapes and part of the exercise is to get my eye ‘tuned’ to specific subjects. Then weed out repetitious ones. I find it takes some time and this is where I have developed a personal style the most.
But how could I turn down the chance to hike up into fog? In Cambridgeshire you must wait for the season and the conditions. In the spring time here it is available almost on demand. In the wet the colors really saturate and everything looks new. Below are my attempts to find interesting images.
Once you are off the sun-exposed slopes there is a rich carpet of moss on the rocks.
The ferns are just starting to grow
In the steeper sections the sense of looking into the abyss.
The trail relents in some sections.
The yellow glacier lilies got more abundant the higher I climbed.
Doug Morse
Near where I turned around the fog settled in.
I managed to get myself absorbed in the photography which felt great but I also lost track of time. What I supposed was denser clouds and fog moving in I realized was actually the sun setting behind the mountian. I decided to turn around and it was just as well as I had half a mind to carry on I was enjoying myself so much. The last half mile was almost completely dark as I picked my way down the rocky trail in twilight and arrived at my truck about an hour after sunset.
