Summit Elevation (m): 1945
Trip Date: June 05 2021
Elevation Gain (m): 300
Round Trip Time (hr): 2
Total Trip Distance (km): 10
Quick ‘n Dirty Rating: Class 2 – you fall, you tripped on your untied shoelace. Pay attention!
Difficulty Notes: Easy hiking up a series of logging roads, cutlines and OHV tracks. Slight bushwhacking to the summit.
Technical Rating: OT2
GPS Track: Gaia
When we got down from a slightly underwhelming hike of Baseline Mountain Cornelius Rott and I decided to try the last remaining foothill that I had in the area – Idlewilde Mountain. I knew that Dave Salahub had snowshoed the mountain in 2020 and didn’t have a lot of great things to say about it so to say my expectations were low is an understatement.
I was feeling a bit let down with the way the day was turning out, considering how nice the weather was despite a gloomy forecast – especially to the west where the sun was clearly still dominating the landscape. Obviously we should have taken more of a chance on a real mountain earlier in the day… Oh well. There was nothing to do about it now except tag my last foothill in the area that held my interest. On the plus side, Cornelius has traveled the world and has enough fascinating stories to keep me entertained for another dozen easy bumps like Baseline and Idlewilde.
Instead of using the cutline from hwy 734 (40) we drove a bit further south and parked at a relatively fresh logging road, deciding to use it instead. Normally this hike starts with losing ~50 vertical meters down the cutline before gaining it all back. Our route avoided that first dip very nicely. We hiked up the road until noticing the old cutline on our left. We aimed for it and hiked steeply up to it’s high point before turning left down a faint OHV track.
From the top of the first cutline the hiking followed a series of OHV tracks through cutblocks, open slopes and cutlines. The route is almost impossible to describe so I’m providing the GPX track here. The reason I’m giving the GPX track is that Idlewilde Mountain is a surprisingly scenic little hike. It sports decent views to the west and has a delightful little surprise along the way in the form of a sinkhole canyon under the summit.
The summit itself was a bit disappointing – buried in the forest with no views – but everything else about Idlewilde was 5x better than Baseline Mountain. Next to other bumps in the area only Limestone and Ram Mountain are better IMHO.
As we descended the peak we noticed very black clouds heading our way from the SE and heard peels of thunder. Time to give ‘er! We almost made it too. Just before the truck the storm centered above us and started flashing lightning and dumping small pellets of hail on us.
I enjoyed Idlewilde much more than I thought I would and can easily recommend it as an easy, quiet hike when you only have time for something small and are in the area.
hey Vern, did this and baseline yesterday lol. No fresh logging road but its only a short slog to the cutline. Those deppresions in the earth were neat but not much else to say about this one! lol