The Wagonhammer Experience

It feels like deja vu. Mist rolling in over rounded scree covered mountains, fishermen casting into rivers, heating still on in June, skin covered in bug bites...

I could be in parts of Scotland, but no, I am in central Idaho,

our fifth wheel is parked beside the Wagonhammer RV park office, in view of the Salmon River, and the American mosquitoes are ganging up on me just like the Scottish midges used to do.

Having said that, when the sun is out, Wagonhammer RV park is one the prettiest parks I have stayed in during my many years of camping in Europe and the USA.

Working here is a pleasure. The managers treat us like family, with many communal meals shared during the quieter month of May. Richard keeps busy grooming the 12 acres of grass that is the main part of the park.

Richard cutting the lush grass at Wagonhammer RV park

 There is a bridge over a side tributary of the Salmon river leading to an island where dogs can run free and you can hunt for morel mushrooms.  Richard only cuts a portion of that.  Here's what Richard found - very nice fried in butter.

Morel mushrooms 

June has been much busier for me: keeping an eye on the laundry; retail customers browsing the on-site store;

taking phone and email bookings, and checking in up to a dozen new visitors daily. There are a few who stay the whole season (from April to October), but Wagonhammer is mostly a short stay resort for people of all ages during the summer, and hunters in May and October. The grassy riverside sites (most of which are very spacious) are a big draw.

A lot of customers are from Montana and Idaho, weekenders enjoying nature. Many who have been here before come back. There is plenty of wildlife to check out on the hills with binoculars, including a pair of bald eagles and their soon to be fledged chick on a nest just across the river from the park, and if you take a drive alongside the Salmon river

Pretty impressive rapids as the river was very high

you can make encounters of the closer kind with deer, mountain sheep (I could have sworn it was a
goat!),


elk, moose, snakes, and bear. Luckily we met none of the last two on the various hikes taken during our days off.

Here's Richard relaxing in some natural hot springs - reached via a two mile hike, and a 1000 ft climb in elevation.

Gold Bug Hot Springs

Historically, this area was home to the Nez Perce and Shoshone tribes, with artifacts going back over ten thousand years. In 1804, when Thomas Jefferson sent Captains Meriweather Lewis and William Clark on an expedition to discover a north west river passage, he had high hopes that there might be a means to cross the continental divide via east and west flowing rivers, and open the land west of the Missouri to commerce and settlers. The local natives were friendly, guiding the newcomers and keeping them alive in the Salmon area during the harsh winter of 1805. Lewis and Clark discovered that the Salmon river was not navigable, (they named it The River of No Return) and neither was there a viable alternative water route, nor was there easy passage by foot over the Bitterroot Mountains.

Nevertheless, their efforts paved the way for settlement of Montana, Idaho, Oregon and Washington. A mini gold rush led to the creation of a town on the Salmon River around 1866, eventually named Salmon City, which acted as a trading center and social hub for miners in the area. Between 1880 and 1930 agriculture became the economic mainstay of the area. The valleys between the mountain ranges support cattle, and there are horses everywhere.  Here are some pictures I took of two photographs taken in the same place just north of Salmon, 150 years apart.  The originals hang in the Lemhi County Museum in Salmon.  Kind of eerie to see the changes that have taken place, and of course, the difference in habitation.

On one of our days off we drove into Montana (the border is about 30 miles north of Wagonhammer), and discovered the beautiful Bitterroot Valley bordered by snow covered mountains.  We hiked round Lake Como,

named by Jesuit Father Ravalli who originally hailed from Ferrara, Italy.

Father Ravalli first set foot in the Bitterroot Valley in 1845 joining other Jesuit priests who were in the process of establishing St Mary's Mission four years after they were invited to the homeland of the local Salish people. Not only did he help with the conversion of the locals, he was a doctor and pharmacist to both the Natives and Settlers until his death, and introduced the skills of gardening, wood-craftsmanship and raising livestock to the area. He planted an orchard, and the oldest apple tree in the valley still stands near a dove cote – also built by Ravalli, for chickens and pigeons to provide year round supplies of meat and eggs.

Ravalli also built a house for the Bitterroot Salish chief Victor at the mission, who lived there until 1870, and his widow until 1884, but despite the friendliness of the Salish people toward the whites who settled in the area, they, along with Pend d'Oreille and the Kootenai tribes who were located further north, were all eventually forcibly moved from their ancestral homelands to the Flathead Reservation some 60 miles west into the Bitterroot mountains.

We toured the Historic St Mary's Mission which is located in Stevensville,

and made another visit to Montana a few weeks later, to the annual Bitterroot Festival in Hamilton. The Bitterroot is the state flower of modern day Montana,

and I was very moved to witness Salish dancers celebrate their heritage and connection with their erstwhile home land and the plant whose roots were a source of sustenance to them for thousands of years.

It's been an interesting and generally enjoyable stay here in Idaho. Today it is wet and dreich (a Scottish word that describes a dull and dreary grey day very well) and only reached 59 F (13 C) at Wagonhammer. It's the kind of depressing weather which means we probably won't feel like going out this evening to ask our fellow camp hosts Barry and Diana to build a fire, like we have on other nights. 

The fire doesn't keep the mozzie's at bay, but it's a comforting place to be, and you can socialize and drink some wine whilst they nibble.

In nine days we leave here and head for Coolidge, Arizona, where it is currently 95 F (35C) and there won't be a green blade of grass visible for miles. Oh well, you can't have everything – but at least there won't be any bloodsucking bugs.