Jack's Week with Grandma

This week was clear back in July! I'm just catching up on my blog entries. Kimball and Wendy went to Las Vegas and then California (Laguna Beach?) for a week and I had Jack for that whole time. :) He was an angel. He's a good little sleeper and we had a great week. Here are some of our activities.

We went day-hiking with my friend Chyrell Cook from work. This is at the base of Little Cottonwood Canyon--Temple Quarry trail. Jack wasn't sure about this at first. He cried for a short bit and then seemed to be OK with it, though I don't think he actually really enjoyed it. Then he fell asleep!

Here we are at Grandma Smith's on her back porch/deck.

Grandma (Great-Grandma, I guess) has a lot of fountains. We were sitting next to this one and Jack was loving playing in it! A bit later he dropped my phone in! Yikes! Luckily, after drying out for a half a day the phone worked fine. Whew.

And here's Grandpa reading Jack a bedtime story.

And the final pic is us visiting Rachel at her apartment in Provo. We went there for lunch (Del Taco, bean/cheese burrito and fries). Rachel is sharing her fries. Jack loved them. Just like Grandma!

Uintas

Taking Karen's family, and Cath and Kiera, for a short hike in the Uintas was my last summer backpacking trip. :( Well, for this summer anyway. We had a nice time visiting together, and most of the kids had a good time, too. As far as having a good time goes, you know the old addage. "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink." You can provide a great, fun activity for a teenager, but you can't make him have a good time.

Here we are just taking off at the Crystal Lake Trailhead about 25 miles up the Mirror Lake Highway. We got a late start, so it was almost noon before we actually headed off. Oh well. :) Back row is Cameron, Karen, Sami, me and Cath. Front is Kiera, Caden, Mikela and Steffi.

Two of our cute little ones--Caden on the left and Kiera on the right. Caden is 8, Kiera 9. Notice Kiera's clothes and equipment, btw. Miniature versions of her grandma's stuff (and mine, for that matter). A nice REI shirt with roll up/button up sleeves, REI zip-off shorts, and, most amazingly, an Osprey pack. Pretty cool! And finally, a "Buff" (that's the brand) head gear just like mine and Cath's.

These pics were all taken on our way to camp. On the left we are crossing a bridge/dam at Long Lake, in the middle we are standing in front of Long Lake, and on the right is our lunch stop. Originally I had hoped to stop for lunch at Long Lake because it's a nice stopping spot, but we started late enough that we had to stop earlier for lunch. This was a nice lunch spot too because it was right at the top of the uphill and so the rest of the hike in was mostly downhill. Karen's family had Lunchables, Cath and I had bagels and cream cheese and fresh fruit. Kiera had a PB & J sandwich. The first lunch is nice because it can still be "real" food. It took us 4 hours to hike 3 1/2 miles into camp (that included our lunch break).

Here we are at camp--Duck Lake. There was a super big rock just barely out in the lake that had a fun little "cave" the kids liked. Here you can see Mikela and Kiera. Then in the center is Cameron and Caden eating dinner. This is where Sami fixed the Ouimette meals. It was very near the lake and had a great view. On the right is Kiera getting water for our dinner. She was a good little helper.

On our middle day I decided to go trail running. I haven't ever done that before and was interested to try it out. Since it was such a short hike in, I wore my Keens instead of boots so I could use my Keens as running shoes. And I carried in a running shirt & shorts. I actually had a pretty good time. I ended up running 7 miles--out to the parking lot and back. It only took about 45 minutes each way this time! Then I met Cath, Kiera, Mikela and Steffi at Island Lake, which was our planned "day hike" for the middle day. They were a bit late getting there so I took advantage of the privacy and had a nice bath, scrubbing off dirt and sweat from the run.

Here's just a pretty shot of the wildflowers and Island Lake. Island Lake was a mile from our camp.

We had a super good time hanging out at Island Lake for hours. The girls played on the cliffs, sometimes scaring themselves with their brave exploits of going to the very edge. I found this ledge (right photo) and had a nap while the rest of them ate lunch (I had eaten my energy bar during my run). A week before our hike Ole had brought his boys up here and they did cliff jumping and swimming here!

These are just pretty shots of the scenery--and we're in some of them. On the left you see the terrain near the lake, in the middle is a lily pad pond, and on the right is a nice shot of Island Lake.

The little girls heard me raving about skinny dipping and they decided to be brave and do it too! On the left is Mikela and on the right is Kiera.

Here's Cath, Karen and me enjoying the nightly fire and visiting. Cameron made the fire each night and Sami put it out. She did a really great job of that.

Here's our actual campsites (I don't have one of the Ouimettes. It was right by our nightly campfire). Cath and Kiera are on the left with their new super-duper Big Agnes SL3. And I'm on the right with my older but just as super-duper Big Agnes SL2.

And finally here we are at Duck Lake just as we're headed back out to the cars. It took a bit longer getting out, but not much. Four hours 15 minutes for a 3 mile hike. (The hike in was slightly longer because we did a loop.) Cameron, Karen, Cath & I are in back. Front (l to r) is Caden, Sami, Steffi, Mikela and Kiera.

Mt. Borah

Mt. Borah is the tallest mountain in Idaho, at 12,668 ft. The route ascends 5,262 vertical feet in just over 3 1/2 miles. That's pretty steep! A teacher friend of Cathy's invited her to climb it with him this summer, and wonderful sister that she is, she invited me!

On the left you can see the teeny tiny tip of Mt. Borah (also known as Borah Peak) as it fades into the skyline. On the right is our camp, with Steve and me. Notice Steve and Cathy's cool new Big Agnes Seedlight 3 tent. (It's the one in the foreground.)

Here we are at the trailhead, 6:30 am on August 7th. We started off with a group of 6--from left to right: Kyle Jenks (Cath's friend), Tom Bugbe (Kyle's brother-in-law), Gary Jenks (Kyle's dad), me, Cathy, Steve.

These two just show parts of the trail. After a couple of hours Tom and Steve went back to camp. Tom was having altitude sickness and Steve was the nicest one of our group and was willing to forgo his climb to take Tom back down. They went into the nearest town (Mackey) and had burgers & fries while they waited!

This is the very beginning of Chickenout Ridge--aptly named. It involved Class 4 climbing, and none of us were experienced climbers. It was super scary and had Cath and me wondering if we really wanted to do this! The really freaky part of this was when we were up on top of this razor-edged ridge.

Here's the ice field. Kyle started out and decided no way could we safely make it across without any proper equipment. So instead we ended up climbing up the rocks on the side of the ice field. It was quite strenuous and also pretty scary. On the right you see a great butt shot of me. Thanks, Cath (official photographer). Once we reached the top we easily walked across the top.

Close to the top in the left pic. Beautiful lake valley in the middle. Gorgeous purple flowers growing practically right in the rock on the right.

Victorious at the top! On the left Cath and I are holding a banner that she made for the occasion. On the right is just me with the flag.

Coming back down the mountain--obviously on a not-very-steep part. The fog was moving in and out and it was also snowing off and on. It was windy and COLD!

Here we are coming back across the ice field. We decided no way could we safely make it the same way we had come up. Climbing down the rocks on the side of the ice field would have been super dangerous. Cath and I each had 2 walking sticks. So each of the 4 of us took one, we pounded the walking stick into the ice, and then held on as we toe-kicked footholds across. Then if we slipped (which we all did) we would be hanging onto the pole. It worked very well.

On the left we are continuing to walk down. Here we are only about an hour from the tree-line. We were excited to reach that point (the tree line) because from there on out it was a fairly easy hike. The right pic just again shows part of the trail. I guess we forgot to take a pic back at camp, so these are the last photos. The whole thing took 14 hours--6:30 am to 8:30 pm. Long! Steve had hot dinner and Postum water waiting for us upon our return. What an angel! A great time was had by all. For those of you who are interested, here is a link to Cathy's blog of the same trip: http://catiemom.blogspot.com/ She's fast! She also has already posted our Uinta backpacking trip which we just got back from!

King's Peak

Rob and I climbed King's Peak on July 29-31st. It was sort of an anniversary trip since our 31st anniversary was August 1st. The weather was fantastic (meaning dry!) and we had a wonderful time. This is the second time we've done this hike. Last time it was with Rachel and McKay and Steve Hobbs. Bad weather that time!

Here we are at the trailhead. We have 8 miles to go to our campsite at Dollar Lake.

This is on the trail going in. On the left is our lunch stop. On the first day we had fresh food--bagels and cream cheese and sliced apples. Yum. In the middle you see me as we're closing in on Dollar Lake. You can see King's Peak in the background. It's in the very center--the little, sharp peak. On the right is Rob on the trail.

This now is day two. From Dollar Lake to the summit is 8 miles, so it's a long 16 mile day. This is just a couple of miles from camp at Gunsight Pass. We met up with a Dad and son who we hiked with all day. They took this photo for us.

Here we are getting close to the summit. Almost all the way is regular trail, but the last part is bouldering.

Here we are at the top. Yea!!!

Here we are still at the top. Last time we did this hike we had about 60 seconds on top to quickly snap a photo before a storm moved in. This time we reveled in being able to stay as long as we wanted. We spent about an hour up top. It was pretty chilly except when the sun came out. Then there was glorious warmth!

These three are just beautiful views from the top.

Here we are at camp. On the left is Rob sipping hot chocolate. I'm setting my stuff up in the center pic. I'm blowing up my super-duper Big Agnes pad, which is part of a integrated bag/pad system. It's the goods! We spent a ton of time reading. Rob was reading a book called "The Emperors of Chocolate." I was reading "The Devil in White City"--on my Kindle of course. :)

Here I am hanging our food, and Rob is showing off our gravity water filter. I used it in Dark Canyon earlier this summer, but this is the first time Rob had used it. He's a believer!

Now we're heading home. In the center, back you can barely see King's Peak.

On the way out--The foot bridge at Elkridge Crossing, me eating lunch at Elkridge, and Rob on the trail.

And, finally, here we are back at the parking lot. We had a really fabulous time! We left camp at 1:00 pm, and even with a 45 minute lunch break we were at the parking lot by 5:00. Going out is a lot faster than going in because it was gentle down hill! We stopped at Wally's Burgers for burgers, fries and malts, in Evanston, on the way home and were home by 9:00.