Note that this photo is out of temporal sequence, but gives a good idea of what the middle part of the ridge is like on the way up to Borah Peak. Well traveled trail, not terribly steep, unlike the first parts, which have a 40% grade.

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The exposure to both sides of this little patch of snow was a bit spooky. 60° snow a couple of thousand feet down to the left, maybe 20 feet of snow down to a cliff on the right. People who would be up there a week or so later had a much easier time after this melted out.

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No summit photos this time; this is as high as we got, just below the start of Chicken-Out Ridge.

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No summit photos this time; this is as high as we got, just below the start of Chicken-Out Ridge.

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With cumulus building this high and this fast, it was definitely time for discretion to be the better part of valour, so we discreetly turned around and headed down.

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The first large snow chute on the right end of the ridge is the runout from the snow bridge we crossed. The main snow bridge is the one in the right center of the shot, just under the puff of clouds. That one obviously also has significant exposure.

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Looking back down the trail, you can see how it skirts the ridge.

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Tantalizingly close, but even though you can see the car (the white speck right in the center of this shot, at the right end of the wide spot where the road ends), you have the hardest hiking of the route as you go back down that miserable 40% grade.

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As you get back to treeline, there are a few camping spots. The best are right up on the ridge, just as you run out of the trees and onto the rocks. Next time, we'll probably hike up that far the evening before and save a couple of hours the next morning.

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The 1983 earthquake left this scarp that extends for several miles along the margin of the Lost River valley.

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Craters of the Moon National Monument has some truly bizarre landforms, the result of multiple lava flows over the fairly recent geologic past. (Recent enough that active flows figure in the Native American legends of the region.)

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Reportedly, the Polynesian term "aa" means "hurts the feet." From the surface of this aa lava flow, it is obviously an accurate description!

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Pahoehoe lava, by contrast, flows at a much higher temperature and forms smooth to ropey surfaces like this.

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When the lava flow continues long enough, a crust cools while the flow continues below the crust. If the center is still molten when the flow stops, it may drain out, leaving a lava tube or cave like this one.

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