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View E to Taylor Mountain el 9855', along the brink. 9/16/04.
Photo by Rick Baugher.
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Centennial Mountains
The Centennial Mountains are the premier east-west trending mountain range of the Northern Rockies. Montana and Idaho share these wild lands of the Continental Divide from Monida Pass at stateline milepost 624 to Red Rock Pass at milepost 686. Heading north out of Idaho Falls my gaze tends to focus on the range's three dominant mountain masses: Baldy/Slide, Sheep/Taylor, and Jefferson/Sawtell. In winter these broad, open, moderately steep slopes get brilliantly white. They look terribly inviting. The perspective from Montana is different. The Centennial Mountains provide some of the highest quality scenic values in southwestern Montana. The landscape has high, rugged, forested mountains. The dramatic 3000 foot rise of the northern face is a well known landmark in southwestern Montana- a veritable fortress wall.
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Rock Creek Knob el 9584'. Photo by
Rick Baugher, 4/18/99.
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Rock Creek Knob el 9584' is entirely within Idaho, but follow any direction of N,S, E, W, and you'll end up in Montana. 8/2/06.
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Summit glyph carving. Photo Rick Baugher.
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Mining, grazing, and hunting have been the traditional human activities in the Centennial Mountains, but on July 4, 1904, someone went peak bagging. Summit glyph carving on sandstone.
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Nemesis Mountain el 9449'. Photo Rick Baugher.
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Nemesis Mountain el 9449' has turned out to be a nemesis for me. On 6/19/05 a summit inspection yielded no sign of prior visitors. Certainly others must
have been up this spectacular mountain. But who, and when? Alas, my nemesis.
From the summit of Nemesis Mountain the view is west to the Red Rock Lakes in Centennial Valley, Montana. The range got its name from this valley, which was thrown open to settlement in 1876- the US centennial year.
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