Friday, May 29, 2020

Bear Canyon Suspension Bridge

hikers: Mark, Lecia, Daniel, Rose

You can tell we really like this hike!  It's close, easy, fun, and a rewarding destination and view.  Since Daniel was here we wanted to do a short hike and chose this one.  
This time we were here mid morning, and there were lots of cars in the parking lots but it wasn't as fully packed as the evenings we have been here.

Ready to go!  Rosie was awake at this point and ready to hike!

Yup.  Both signs are true.

On the bridge

Looking down.

This was adorable Rosie for most of the hike.  I think she liked it!

We ran into this guy on the way down.  I don't think he is a rattler, 

although later I saw on a website there have been quite a few rattlesnake sightings. 

May 4, 2020

Bear Canyon Suspension Bridge

Hikers:  Dad, Mom, Ethan


For F.U.N (Family Unity Night, another acronym for FHE) Ethan and I took Mark on the hike to the suspension bridge since he missed it last time when we went for Annie's graduation.  We did the loop the opposite direction this time.  We did the switchbacks up to the aquaduct trail and continuing on to the Bonneville Shoreline trail and after crossing the bridge going down Ralph's trail.  

April 23, 2020

Bear Canyon Suspension Bridge

hikers:  Landon, Annie, Ethan, Mom

We were celebrating Annie's graduation from BYU and Annie, Landon, Ethan and I hiked up to the suspension bridge in Draper.  It was the first time for all of us, except Landon.  This was a fun hike!

We started at the trailhead at the Orson Smith Park in Draper.  The parking lot was full!  Lots of people hiking and walking these days with the coronavirus limiting so many activities.  

Starting out.  The cloud cover was a good thing on this trail at this time of day.

A sign on the trail.

It was a 2.3 mile loop.  Switchbacks from the parking lot to the aqueduct trail.  Walk a ways north on the aqueduct trail and more switchbacks up to the Bonneville shoreline trail.  That is where the suspension bridge is and it's cool.  Then you come down the trail on the other side of the suspension bridge and it has some switchbacks, so that tells you there is some elevation gain, but its doable and a good family hike.  This was an overcast day, if not it would have been a hike in the afternoon sun since there are not a lot of trees.

This was just before we got to the bridge, and I took this photo for my brother, Ralph!

The awesome bridge and my awesome kids, cougars all of them!

I read there is another bridge beyond that, which is worth continuing on to see, but we weren't aware of that.  Next time

And then it was home to celebrate the graduation with the rest of the crew.
I don't know how to rotate the image but you get the idea.  mmmmm!

Friday, March 27, 2020

Hell Canyon

hikers: Mark and Lecia

First hike of the season and it was a new one for me.  Who knew Hell Canyon is near Ensign Peak.  We were at the capitol for Mark to pick up something from work and he showed me where he has taken hikes/walks at lunch.  There weren't a lot of people but according to him there were more than he used to see during his lunchtime walks.  If you are in Salt Lake its a convenient little hike because it is so accessible.

To get to this hike you go north of the Utah State Capitol on Columbus Street and park at the top of the street.  The street turns right, that's your only option, and that's the road you follow.  Follow the road go through the gate and continue walking along the curvy road.  Once you get around the curves you'll see a neighborhood and just before the first house on the left there is a gravel path that goes off to the left.  That is the path you take.  There is a doggy doo doo can there, dogs are allowed on this hike.  

The first park of the hike goes uphill and then you are right by the backyards of those big houses on the hill.  This is the view.  If you know where to look you can see Mark's office window!

After that it flattens out until you get to Hell Canyon.  The trail goes along the side of the mountain next to the backyards and soon you are looking off to the west and over victory road.  Not a beautiful view if you are just looking down but if you look out you really have a view.  Same view the big houses on the hill have.  Continue on and you feel like you are walking to North Salt Lake.  You'll come to the sign that says Hell Canyon.  

Go to the right on that trail.  Once you get into that little canyon the trail starts to climb and has some switchbacks.  We got into the canyon and went a ways but eventually it was so muddy we decided it was time to turn around.   We had snow this past week and there were patches of snow next to the trail.  We probably went about 3/4 mile from where we parked before turning around.

There is also a trail head on Victory Road.  We could see it as we were hiking along near the houses. 

Friday, October 25, 2019

Mount Timpanogos Trail to First Falls

hikers:  mark and lecia

The trail starts at the parking lot just above Aspen Grove.  

It's just past the booth where you pay to go up the Alpine Loop so there is a $6 charge.

On a beautiful day the parking lot would be packed but this late in the season there was plenty of parking.  

This is also the parking lot where you start the trail to Stewart Falls.

It's a much used and well worn trail.  As you can see it is marked to help you stay on track.  The trail is paved in some parts.

We were hoping for some fall color and leaves but at this point in the season the leaves were all on the ground.

We saw a few hikers including one that had summited  Timp earlier and was on his way down. 

Mostly we saw photographers.  Here and also all along our drive on the Alpine Loop.

And here are the first falls!  

It's about a mile to get from the parking lot to the falls.

This is as far as we went today and it worked perfectly because the sun was going down but we got back to the parking lot before it was dark.    

What a beautiful view heading back down the trail!

October 4, 2019

Snow Canyon State Park

Hikers:   Mark & Lecia

We were in St. George to watch Landon run the marathon on Saturday and since we got there Friday afternoon we went to Snow Canyon for some hiking.  Neither Mark or I had ever been to Snow Canyon but we did some fun hikes.  One of the things I loved about the hiking trails was that they were well marked.  If it wasn't obvious where the trail went you would see a sign.

It didn't necessarily tell you the name of the trail but it let you know you were on the trail and at times that was really helpful.  Also the trails weren't crowded.  We did see other people but the further we got from the trail head the fewer people we saw.

Jenny's Canyon

This was a fun little hike, and I do mean little!  Only a half mile round trip.  Very family friendly.

You walk through sand.  At the end of the trail you can go left to a slot canyon and right to an overlook.

The small slot canyon is a fantastic reward for such a short hike.

This is a picture from the overlook.

The next hike was a combination of several trails: 

Petrified Dunes/Hidden Pinyon/West Canyon Road/Lava Flow Trail/Butterfly Trail

I don't know how far we went but we started out on the petrified dunes and that was an awesome place to walk and explore.  

We just walked along and then I noticed that there were these markers anchored in the rock and if you kept following them they eventually took you to the end of the rock. See the anchor with arrows in the next picture.  Well, if you look you can see one even further and so you know where to go.  I didn't even know if we could go down from this rock but there was a marker down there so we just kept going!

We went down from the rock, saw a trail sign and just kept going until we came to an overlook.  Then we backtracked a little took another trail for a short ways, Hidden Pinyon, that took us to the West Canyon Road that we could see from the overlook.   Lucky thing we had taken the map they gave us at the pay station.  Without it we couldn't have hiked the loop made up by all these trails.  Like I mentioned before, the trail markers were really helpful, but they didn't say what trail you were on.  

Interesting moss growing on some rocks.

After walking along the  West Canyon Road we finally came to the Lava Flow Trail.

We had to hike quite a ways on that trail before we came to the Lava Tubes.  We saw a couple of them.  One especially was quite impressive and I suppose people explore them but I am not sure how you get down there and we were happy to look at it from above.

We only saw a couple of the lava tubes before we turned onto the butterfly trail.  Maybe we missed some great things by not going all the way on the Lava Flow Trail, but our car was parked at the trail head to the butterfly trail.  It turned out to be an interesting trail through lava fields, and included going up some rock, and in an area with more vegetation we saw this cute rabbit!  He just sat there chewing while we looked at him.

Here's the map that we used to find the different trails and hike a loop.  We started at the parking lot for the petrified dunes and the butterfly trail head.

There is a variety of terrain we hiked through, even in the short distances we went.  All of them were quite sunny and we stopped a couple of times to empty sand from our shoes!

September 14, 2019

Pa'rus Trail

hikers:  Lecia, Mark

This is more of a walk than a trail.  It starts at the South Campground and goes to Canyon Junction.  It's paved all the way.  It would be fun to bike it. We walked it in the morning and there is not a lot of shade so I would not do it in the afternoon on a hot day.   I didn't take any pictures but here's a description of what we did.
We started at the visitor's center and got slightly off track by exploring the south side of the river where the watchman trail goes. This is a shady area along the river and there is access to the river that would be fun for kids.  But back to our walk along the Pa'rus trail. From the visitors center you go north and cross the road and the trail is on the north side of the river. We walked a couple of miles until we got to the Canyon Junction.  There is nice river access there as well.  We picked up the shuttle at Canyon Junction and rode it back to the visitors center, then we walked another half mile to get to our campground. 
Jacob had stayed at the campground and while we were walking he packed up the tent and all of our camping gear!  
This is a walk you could enjoy at night and have a good view of the night sky.  Maybe we can to that another day - I mean night.