Friday night (7/23) we camped at the Wasatch Mountain State Park. We did a nice evening hike, the settled in for a cool night at last. The low in the morning was 54ºF. We slept with the windows open and the camper was down to 59ºF by morning. Ahhhh!
I wanted to hike the Lake Mary Trail on Saturday (7/24). It's 2.6 miles RT with an 850' elevation gain. I wanted to go early (more on why below). Elena is not a morning person or a vertical hike person, so we agreed I would drive to the trailhead early and she and Bebop could hang out in the van. The Cottonwood Canyon areas do not allow dogs.
From our camp site there were two routes. The bigger road was 29 miles, but Google Maps suggested a shorter 13 mile road through the mountains. Unfortunately, it had some major vertical mileage. We climbed 4,000 feet in about 8 miles, then back down 2,500 feet to the trailhead. At the pass we saw some of the largest Aspen trees I've ever seen, and possibly became the third vehicle (and first non-billionaire) to reach outer space in the past couple of weeks.
I got up the trail with a steady heart rate of about 130bpm and reached the lake to find only about 8 other people. I sat and enjoyed the view for a bit, then hiked up halfway around the lake for a different view. As I came back to the trailhead the crowd had grown to about 60 people - and more were coming up every minute. Just then I spotted a moose on the edge of the lake, so I climbed on a rock and watched it graze for about 30 minutes.
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| Lake Mary |
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| Moose grazing at Lake Mary |
Why hike early? Big crowds. Why big crowds? We didn't realize that we were in Utah on a major holiday - Pioneer Day. Everyone was heading into the mountains for the holiday weekend. We even had to detour around a local parade as we exited Cottonwood Canyon.
In the afternoon, we drove to Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake. More to come on that adventure.
--Paul
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