Tubbs Hill Nature Area

Tubbs Hill protects roughly a hundred and sixty acres of undeveloped lakeshore right at the edge of downtown Coeur d'Alene, a forested peninsula that the city has kept as a natural area rather than sold off to development. A network of trails threads the hill, with the main interpretive loop running a couple of miles around the perimeter past woodland, rocky points, and small beaches.

The character changes as you circle. The shaded north side runs through timber and old stone, while the south side opens to sun, granite slabs, and wide water views, with coves where the lake laps right up to the rock. Hundreds of thousands of people walk it every year, and yet on a weekday morning you can still have a viewpoint to yourself.

The hill carries the name of Tony A. Tubbs, a German immigrant who came to the young town of Coeur d'Alene in 1882, served as its first justice of the peace, and built its first hotel. He claimed a homestead on the hill in 1884 and meant to lay out house lots on it.

It never happened. The ground was too steep and rocky to build on cheaply, so the hill sat undeveloped through the decades while the town grew up around it, a happy accident of bad terrain. In the 1960s, local preservationists seized the opportunity and folded the hill into the city's park system, cementing as public land what had survived only because it was too rugged to sell.

Long before any homestead, this shore was the homeland of the Coeur d'Alene people, who call themselves the Schitsu'umsh, meaning roughly the ones who were found here. The lake and its rivers were central to their life and remain central to the Coeur d'Alene Tribe today, whose reservation lies along the lake's southern reaches.

Lake Coeur d'Alene itself is one of the loveliest in the West, a long, mountain-ringed body of water that draws boaters, anglers, and paddlers all summer. From the rocks of Tubbs Hill you look out over that expanse, with ospreys and bald eagles working the water and the forested hills stacking up beyond.

The hill is a small pocket of habitat that punches above its weight. White-tailed deer move through the timber, songbirds fill the canopy, and the granite outcrops warm in the sun. In spring the open slopes flush yellow with arrowleaf balsamroot and other wildflowers, and the whole hill feels freshly green.

Every season has its version of the walk. Summer is for swimming from the coves and catching a sunset over the lake. Fall brings crisp air and color, spring brings flowers and birdsong, and even winter offers a bracing, quiet loop with the city hushed behind the trees. It is one of the easiest great walks in Idaho to fit into a day.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.