July 11: Mount Timpanogos, via Timpanokee Trail, Utah – Goat’s View

Posted by Goat

WOW! With a capital OW! I’ll just give the highlights, since Tar already posted the details. We started up the back side for a change. I had read that it was supposedly flatter and for a little while it was. I thought this trip wasn’t bad in the beginning, but once we started hitting the snow trails, it became a different matter. One would think that we Iowans have never walked on snow. This is not like the type of snow that we typically walk on. First, the snow we walk on isn’t half melted from underneath with a river running under it. Now not all had a river, but we couldn’t see how deep or what was underneath most of it, so the uncertainty was kinda unnerving… Also, the snow we’re used to isn’t at a steep angle. We did pretty well up to what appeared to be the last ridge, and would have gone up it, but the snow field there was not something that we were willing to try. We had crossed so many (OK, maybe 4) that we just couldn’t handle the nerves of trying this one, plus, remember, what goes up, must come down. So we would have had to cross it again… just like we did with the others. Did I mention the times we slipped on the others? Not each one, but I did on one and Tar did on another. Actually, I think I did twice, once without Wally and once with. Tar’s was with Wally. He didn’t like those much… kept saying “NO, NO…”

The OW part came on the way back. The constant down hill, and then with Wally adding pressure on my hips, and the heat added to a great deal of pain. Once we got back to the trailhead, I found the water fountain with a spigot on the lower post and I stuck my feet under the water until they were frozen. Felt good! Another part of the OW, is typical of new hikes, we had no idea where the trail was or where the lake was, so after every turn, it was always, “are we there yet?”.

We wish we could have made it over that ridge, but maybe when that snow isn’t there anymore.

Goat

You can also read Tar’s narrative and a technical description with photos.

July 11: Mount Timpanogos, via Timpanokee Trail, Utah – Tar’s view

Posted by Tar

Well, Mt. Timp wins again. Story of my life. (But we decided today that our last attempt did not count as I had just borne a child less than 3 months prior to our trip, and that’s a darn good reason for being a wuss.)

We’ve never tried the back side of Timp, so we decided to give that route a try today. I think it seemed a little easier, but the views weren’t as awe-inspiring as those from the front side. I think the Timpanokee trail route might also be longer.

We’ll add pictures and a better technical description at a later date. For now, we’re just each going to blog about our experiences today.

For me, I wore Wally the whole way up the mountain, and part of the way back down. Not to harp on this, but that is almost a third of my bodyweight, and in the Ergo, which I don’t find all that comfortable, I was absolutely miserable for part of the trip. Miserable. I think I even used the phrase “F—ing miserable” to describe it.

And in case you’re curious, my cadence music for this hike was “In my Life” from Les Miserables. Well, at least, the three lines I could remember of that song. Halfway back down, I consciously changed to “A is for Alex” from the Signing Time videos because I was rather sick of those three lines after 6 hours.

The hike itself started off like nearly every other hike here in the Wasatch. The first mile sucked. I think this might just be me, though, because Goat didn’t think the first mile was bad. I think I just need a mile to get into the groove. At about this point, when I was breathing heavily and wondering how I was going to make it another 7 miles up, we were passed by three college students, zipping along like nothing. That made me feel GREAT about myself, let me tell you.

After three or four or ten stream crossings, we came to a snowfield, which I was terribly excited about. I took pictures. Then we realized, well, the trail went under the snowfield and, uh, where the heck was it? Utahns apparently do not believe in marking their trails very well, because we never saw another trail marker after the trailhead. We did find the trail again, though, with very little effort.

Then we were passed by a power hiker, shortly before the next snowfield, which was Ginormous. We considered ourselves fortunate that we could follow this dude to see where he went. The funny thing was, he didn’t falter a single step across the snow. Just step step step step. (This is not like walking on snow back home, which is usually level. This is a snowfield on the side of a mountain, if you slip, you slide down the mountain.) We slowed waaaaay down and gingerly picked our way across the snow, nearly fainting when we realized that we would have to walk over a snow-covered stream.

See, the water melts out from UNDER the snow. So there’s a stream under a few feet of snow, or at least you hope it’s a few feet. All the hiking books – as well as signs at trailheads – warn of how dangerous this is, since the snow can give way underneath you without warning, plunging you into frigid water below with no way out. I’m sure the danger is not as bad as all that, but what do we know? We don’t live here.

Anyway, we made it across the ginormous snowfield OK, as well the next one. At that next one, we looked up to find where our trail was going and saw that it appeared to go over another snowfield about a mile or two up. Except this snowfield appeared to be very steep. We decided to hike to it and see if it looked as bad up close, and also to see if we could tell how close we were to the top.

Well, it did look as bad up close. People had crossed it, obviously, and if we didn’t have Wally, we would have, as well. But one wiggle from him at the wrong time and it wouldn’t have been pretty. You’ll see when we get the pictures up. So, disappointed though we were, we decided it would be best to head back. We were at 9120 feet above sea level (the peak is 10,500 or so, we started at around 6900) and 5.5 miles from the trailhead.

We did get a look at some pink snow, which is actually caused by a fungus that is slightly radioactive. Interesting, eh?

We booked it back down, took a break at a clearing for about a half hour to let Wally stretch his legs. (He walked for a short portion of the way up, but wanted to use the binocs, and is really bad at walking AND using binoculars. We gave him a choice of walking or having the binocs, and he chose binocs.) After the break, we hoofed it nearly as fast as we could go until we reached the trailhead and the hot hot car. We were SO tired.

As I type this, it is 8:30, about 5 or so hours after we finished, and I can’t be still for more than about 10 minutes without paying a huge price in muscle soreness. I have a bottle of Arnica waiting for me in the tent.

For the record, our other attempts have been:

2002: We were about a mile or two from Emerald Lake when it started to storm. We’d kept our eye on the dark clouds coming over the mountain for a while, and when we started to see lightening, we headed back down. Though we were very disappointed, we still agree that we made a smart decision, especially for being quite unfamiliar with mountains and weather patterns.

2004: This is the aforementioned shortly-after-childbearing hike. We walked a pathethic mile or two to the first falls and turned around. We also, for some reason I still don’t understand, felt compelled to carry Wally in the Kelty Kangaroo pack (a Snugli-like soft front pack). This was the one and only time I’ve ever worn that carrier, which we purchased on clearance for $5. IT SUCKED.

 

One last note – I think that the hike to the top is not as hard for most people as it is for us. First, we huff and puff in general with the altitude. This year, since we were coming from Colorado, it wasn’t as bad. Second, we are carrying Wally, which is fairly difficult, especially since we don’t have a good frame pack that we can both wear. But I think Mt Timp is very doable for most people, without toddlers!!

 

You can also read Goat’s narrative and a technical description with photos.

July 9, 2006: Doughnut Falls Trail, Big Cottonwood Canyon, Utah

Posted by Tar

The Doughnut Falls trail starts from the same trailhead as the Cardiff Mine trail, except it follows an actual trail, and not a road.

A sign posted at the trailhead noted that the falls are on private land, and the Forest Service does not have a right of way for most of the trail, and requests that trail users respect the private property. It strongly leads you to believe that you should not visit the falls, but we (and the approximate 20 other people we passed) completely ignored the advice. More about this can be found here. I did not see any No Trespassing signs, nor any indication of where we were not allowed to go, so I think we were in the clear?

This trail is very poorly marked, but is still fairly easy to follow. Look for the empty signposts (we assumed that the posts used to have trail markers, but when the property owners started asserting their private property rights a few years ago, they took them down). Somebody has written TRAIL with arrows on most of the signs, so that will help. When there is no post, go straight.

The first little bit of the trail is steep uphill and rocky footing. Then the trail turns to the right and gets easier to walk. Cross a few bridges, and you’ll eventually come to the two large graffiti-ed rocks that are also visible from the Cardiff Mine trail. Keep going and, around a few curves, and you’ll reach the stream and the first of your many (fairly easy) challenges. Climb down the rocks to the streamside, then continue upstream. Several yards upstream, you’ll need to cross the stream. Pick your path – we chose to cross over the logs, but several others chose to pick a path through the rocks.

I’ll stop to note that crossing a wide, fast-moving, freezing cold mountain stream with a squirmy two year old on your back is HARD. I had my hiking poles which helped a lot, as I was able to use them to help keep my balance.
<- Crossing / We Made it! ->

<–The Goat took a picture of every footstep across the stream

Many people chose to continue up to the very top of the falls, climbing on rocks and scrambling up the last bit. We chose to stop after the stream crossing, as I was not about to rock climb with Wally. (And one “helpful” woman felt the need to point out to me that she didn’t think we should attempt the final ascent with a baby. Well duh.)

But the falls were quite pretty, and it was very cool and breezy there. After a few minutes, we picked our way back to the parking lot. BTW, Doughnut falls is so named because the water falls through a hole in the rock, making the rock look somewhat like a doughnut. Or so I hear, because you apparently have to be right up there to really see it.

<- The Falls

Total Mileage: 7.8 miles including Cardiff Mine, 1.3 just Doughnut Falls
Total Time: Over 4 hours including Cardiff Mine, about an hour just Doughnut Falls

More info about the hike here. Most other websites have been taken down…

July 9, 2006: Cardiff Mine, Big Cottonwood Canyon, Utah

Posted by Tar

The Cardiff Mine trail starts from Mill South Fork B (check this) trailhead. You can reach this trailhead via Big Cottonwood Canyon, turning south at the Jordan Pines Picnic Area spur road. This is also the trailhead for Doughnut Falls (which we also hiked).

The Cardiff Mine trail is really an old mining road.

The trail goes up to a few old mining buildings and the entrance to the mine itself, which has been boarded up. From the trailhead, you follow the road you drove in on and will shortly pass a gate intended to keep motorized traffic out. (We were passed by some ATVs, though, so I guess the gate doesn’t always work.) From this gate, it’s about 2.5 miles to the mine entrance.

Not more than a half mile in, there’s a fork in the road – the first of many. Looking down the left fork, you’ll see two big rocks (which were covered with graffiti on our visit). Taking this path will actually lead you to the Doughnut Falls trail. To get to the mine, go right.

The road forks several more times – generally speaking, always pick the one that looks most like a road. (Or that goes the most uphill!) There were a few stream crossings that, during our visit in early July, were not bad at all, and we were easily able to cross on tall rocks without getting wet feet.

At about 2.5 miles, there is another fork in the road. Looking to the right, you can see an old mining building. Head up the trail a wee bit more, and there’s another mining building (or what’s left of it) and the mine entrance. We actually walked past this on accident, thinking we needed to head up the trail a bit more. This added a full mile (steeply uphill) to our hike! Yikes. So here’s a hint if you decide to go: If you see a tall wooden structure on your right as you’re huffing up a hill, stop, turn around, and take the other path!!

<—- Don’t walk by this! Click on the pic for a bigger image, the wooden structure you can see on the left is also part of the mine.

This trail was listed as easy in the description we read, and perhaps it is if you’re from Utah and used to the elevation and Wasatch hiking. We flatlanders, however, found it to be moderately challenging. It wasn’t all that technical of a trail, and the path was wide and relatively easy to follow, but the trail itself is difficult to walk. The surface, which is mostly scree (loose rocks of all sizes), is hard on the feet. Heading up to the mine, we encountered a few stretches that were fairly steep – and it was all uphill. Heading back down from the mine, though gravity was on our side, the footing was still challenging.

Other thoughts? We left at 9:30 and got back around 1ish. The way up, we had plenty of shade, with one long stretch (about a mile) that was exposed. The way down, with the sun directly overhead, we had precious little shade and it was HOT. The mine buildings were cool to see. We’re going to find out exactly what the Cardiff Mine mined. We guessed copper or iron, based on the reddish rocks and water. There was also a beautiful waterfall at the mine area, and the path largely followed a rushing mountain stream. The views were pretty, and at one point I looked up and was a bit startled at the beauty of the scene around me. Mountains, trees, wildflowers, some great vistas.

<—This is the entrance to the mine.

On the way down, we passed a family – grandfather, mother, and two sons. One of the kids, about 12, told us that his grandfather was the owner of the Cardiff Mine. Whether he was or whether we wasn’t, we are not sure, but it was an interesting encounter nonetheless.

Total mileage: About 6.5 miles. Would have been closer to 5 if we hadn’t detoured.
Time including rest breaks and time to explore the mine area: 3-4 hours.

Cadence music: I think I’ll go for a walk outside now, the summer sun’s calling my name….Everybody’s smiling – Sunshine Day!  From the Brady Bunch.

For another description of the trail, please see this website, which is where we originally got the directions for this trail.

<—- Sleeping Wally

Update: More Photos here

July 5: Alberta Falls and Bear Lake from Glacier Gulch TH; RMNP, CO

posted by Tar

Alberta Falls and Bear Lake Hikes, RMNP, Colorado

Today we hiked to Alberta Falls and Bear Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. This was a super easy hike, made challenging only by the altitude (to which we are unaccustomed) and our two year old, who was tired yet insisted on hiking by HIMSELF!!

 

<— This is, of course, Wally hiking by himself. Yes, he has his own poles.

We started at the Glacier Gorge Junction Trailhead and headed first to Alberta Falls. The trail was a slight uphill, very wide and with a compacted gravel surface. It was very scenic, with nice views of the stream much of the way. The falls were a little disappointing, as the view was of the side, and rather obstructed by rocks. It was still pretty, but not the best mountain waterfall I’ve seen.

<– The trail & Alberta Falls –>

Wally hiked the first part of the trail with his hiking poles, then tired of the poles, then tired of walking entirely. But when we arrived at the falls, he wanted down, so we let him wander a bit. Off trail exploring is allowed in the RMNP in most places, so Goat just followed him around for a bit while I took some pictures of the falls, and then took pictures of a few families for them.

The hike back down was that strange combination of easy and difficult that most downhill walks are. The hike was a total of 1.2 miles round trip.

Once we reached the junction with the Bear Lake trailhead, we decided to go ahead and head down to Bear Lake. Or, up to Bear Lake to be more accurate.

<— The trail to Bear Lake. Looks very similar to the trail to Alberta Falls.

This was not a bad hike, but it was mostly uphill and I was carrying the dead weight of a sleeping two year old (30 lbs, a third of my own bodyweight). The lake was pretty, and has a wide, pressed dirt, accessible path around it. See, Iowans seem to believe that paths must be paved to be accessible, but they are not similarly afflicted here in Colorado.

<— This is of course Bear Lake. Very pretty Alpine lake, mirror-like.

The hike to the lake, around the lake, and back added just over a mile to our hike. Grand total today was about 2.5 miles. Not bad for the first day in a high altitude, IMO!

More photos here.

July 5, 2006: Alpine Ridge Trail, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado

Posted by Goat

So… after a beautiful drive up the Fall River Road up to the Alpine Visitors Center, all while Wally was fast asleep, we decided to take the very well traveled trail to the top of the mountain. Everyone and the little brother was walking up this trail – or down the trail. We decided that it would be a good way to start off our high altitude hiking, and at 12k + feet, we’re talking HIGH altitude.

<– We’re high up!

<– The trail and its many stairs. Though it looks deserted in this picture, it wasn’t!

I had Wally on my back and Tar had the backpack with the hydration system in it.

Talk about thin air… I’m not to big to admit that it took a bit a bit out of me and I had to stop several times, which was funny in a way, because this was not a difficult hike.

By the time we got to the top and decided to head back, the clouds had started to move across the mountain and so we were suddenly in the middle of a cloud.

<— You can see the clouds rolling in as we watched.

Not many people seemed to worried about this, nor were we, except that the cloud was very warm, and it had previously been very cold. But no lightning strikes for us.

Anyway, the trail was pretty much just a dirt/loose gravel path with wooden ties forming stairs, some short, some tall, which really only mattered coming down.

After getting somewhat used to the altitude, it was a very pretty view, no matter where you were on the trail.

Not one that I would brag about, but definitely a hike/walk that is a must do if you’re in the area.

<– Tundra

<– This is my idea of the Rocky Mountains!

More photos here.

Information about Rocky Mountain National Park.

June 17: Springbrook

I hate to even call this a hike, since it took less than an hour and is just a little trot around the lake at Springbrook, but I had photos, so decided to blog this one, too.

We went camping at Springbrook State Park for the weekend and went for a little hike around the lake in the evening. It was a pleasant little walk, one we've taken numerous times before. Fairly level, with a few little ups and downs. Good views of the lake. 

We crossed paths with a goose family.

   
Wally sees the Geese….. The goose family….. Watching the Geese

Wally wanted to walk the whole path by himself, with his hiking pole, but he reached a point where he was too tired to continue, though he insisted he could walk. Once he got in the wrap, though, he seemed quite relieved that he didn't have to continue to walk.

 

That's it! For more photos, just go here. 

Ledges State Park, May 28 2006

Posted by Tar 

First hike of the season, and we chose Ledges State Park. Neither of us had been there before, which is a shame considering how close it is! We more or less followed the path recommended by the author of Hiking Iowa. It was about 5-6 miles, all told (I forgot the pedometer), and included about a mile on the side of the road.

 The hiking along the side of the road was all out in the sun, but most of the remainder of the hike was in the woods, in the shade. It was really a very pleasant hike, with lots of steep ups and downs into and out of the canyon (or what passes for a canyon around here).

   <– Steps leading up out of the valley.

The park itself was quite crowded when we were there. It was Memorial Day weekend, after all. The campgrounds were all full, there were lots of picnickers, children running this way and that. But we only passed maybe 4 other groups of hikers, so apparently most park visitors don't go on the trails.

The maps provided by the park did include some general vague idea of where trails were located. But the map did not include all of the trails that were actually there, and it did include some trails that actually were not there. And not all the trailheads are marked, so we found ourselves standing in front of small openings in the weeds saying "is this the trail?" And I hate it – hate it – when we can't seem to get started on a hike because we can't find the stinking trail!!

  <– Some wildlife we found along the way. A turtle (which Wally desperately wanted to hold) and a snail (which he also wanted to hold, until it actually touched his skin).

If you go: Don't count on the trail map provided by the park to be of much help! Really, though, you can't go wrong here at Ledges – the trails all seemed nice, over varied terrain, and with nice scenery.

Click here for more photos.