Backpacking Adventure

The pictures are from the end to the beginning: 1. A cool tree that tipped over in a stream bed.
2. One of the many beautiful views 3. Glacier Cirque 4. Our campsite the first night - cool lake 5. Part of the steam Mill (I think) that was on the trail 6. Cole and I before we started out - see how fresh we looked...

We started our trip Friday afternoon after a couple backtracks to get items we forgot but we were finally on the trail at about 6. The terrain was steep (kicked my butt for sure) and I was slow, but the landscape was very pretty. We hihked through wildflowers and aspen groves. Finally two and a half hours later we made it to the lake. I set up the tarp with mats and sleeping bags while Cole cooked mexican rice (yum!). We had a pretty satisfying meal, considering our intense first leg.

The stars started coming out and man, was it beautiful! I love stars anyway, and the fact that they were out in such abundance with no moon and a very vibrant milky way just took my breath away.

The next day camp was collapsed by 10 and we were on the trail by 10:45. We hiked through the glacial cirque (see photos) which again, was some stunning landscape. Three hundred feet of fast verticle gain later was yet another gorgeous view. We pretty much wandered peak after peak with nearly no luck at finding a trail so we just went which way seemed right. After about 4 hours of hiking we came to a place the seemed familiar. We had done some kind of loop and had no idea how we ended up there. We had planned a two night stay on the Steam Mill/Steep Hollow Canyon trail but somehow ended up a day early back to the car.

So after washing off my dirty feet and legs in the cold, refreshing stream we took off to Bear Lake for raspberry shakes and then back to Logan for a night of nice clothes, dinner and a movie. What a way to end the backpacking trip ;)!