El Capitan is a remote mountain summit in the Central Bitterroot Range of western Montana, within the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness managed by the Bitterroot National Forest. It rises about twelve miles west of Darby and roughly three miles east of the Idaho-Montana border, in one of the northern Rockies' large protected wilderness areas. Trapper Peak, about 9.3 miles to the south-southeast, is identified as its line parent and as the highest point in that part of the range. El Capitan lies in a subarctic climate zone, with long, usually very cold winters, mild summers, and winter conditions that can bring temperatures below minus ten degrees Fahrenheit and wind chills below minus thirty degrees Fahrenheit.