With the Linemen on a Cold, Cold Day

Story and Photos by Kris Millgate

Island Park is beautiful in the green season, but summer is short in this high land where winter reigns supreme. I’ve seen Island Park in peak bloom, but now I want to see it in peak gloom. That’s why I’m riding with the Fall River Electric Cooperative line crew in January.

Winter is eight months of gray sky and white ground along the Henry’s Fork of the Snake River. The temperature drops drastically. Heating bills soar dramatically. I’m thinking about heat as I stand in a backcountry snowstorm. I didn’t ski to get here. I didn’t snowmobile either. I arrived via snowcat with a heater blasting so much air I was toasty from nose to toes. Then we arrived at a row of power poles and I had to get out.