First we climbed Hyndman Peak. It's slighly higher than 12000 ft with a ~7 miles one-way approach and a bit over 5000 ft of gain. The main route follows Hyndman creek to the saddle between Hyndman Peak and Old Hyndman peak:
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4406.jpg?variant=medium2)
Hyndman is on the left. Climbing a bit more you get to a nice field of lupine blooms
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4420.jpg?variant=medium2)
And an alpine lake
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4534.jpg?variant=medium2)
Lots more flowers around the lake
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4451.jpg?variant=medium2)
Also lots of butterflies and bees doing their pollination thing
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4550.jpg?variant=medium2)
A bit above the lake, the trail (which was in good shape up to this point) disappears, and a rock scramble begins. This is maybe class-2, and is fairly steep. The North side of the ridge is extremely steep, cliff-like really, so we ascended the boulders on the South side.
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4484.jpg?variant=medium2)
After maybe 1500ft of climbing, we topped out to some pretty nice views.
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4499.jpg?variant=medium2)
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4516.jpg?variant=medium2)
That was fun. The next day we climbed Borah Peak. This is higher (~12600 ft), has a bit more gain on the standard route (~5300ft) and is much more steep (only ~4 miles one way). The route is mostly class 2, with a single exposed class 3-4 section. This section (Chicken-out ridge) isn't particularly difficult, but requires at least one semi-technical move with exposure. The views from the top are pretty good
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4569.jpg?variant=medium2)
But this peak isn't nearly as nice as Hyndman. If this wasn't the Idaho high point, nobody would come here.
Then we parked ourselves in a field, joined by maybe 100 friends, and looked expectantly sky-wards
![Image](https://gal.secretsauce.net/travels/Idaho/DSCF4584.jpg?variant=medium2)