I have been a bit remiss on blogging my season of hiking this year. It is NOT because I have not been hiking. I am still hiking EVERY day. Some days are short and some days are long. I am not going to beat myself up about it, I am just going to start posting again, as I am able.
To get things started, I am posting about my journeys yesterday to eastern Utah into the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest. The first map below shows the journey from my house to Mirror Lake, which is the farthest point to which I traveled. The second map is a zoom in of the area of the mountains where I spent my time.
I left the house at about 5:15am and drove first to the Upper Provo Falls. I have been there before, but I never hiked upstream from the main falls. It was IMPRESSIVE! There were so many cascading falls along the way. When I turned around, there were still more to explore, but I was anxious to get to Tea Cup lake for a paddle.
While the main falls is fantastic, I actually enjoyed hiking further upstream to make, what I believe are better images.
The three images below show a picture of my shooting the main falls on my Nikon, a photographer making slow exposure images of the falls, and a tighter shot of the main falls.
When I finished at the Upper Provo Falls, I went to Tea Cup Lake. I parked on the side of the road and unloaded my kayak. There was no one on the lake. It was about 6:45am and about 48 degrees, so I was not surprised.
From Tea Cup Lake, I drove to the Bald Mountain Pass. I did not have intentions of stopping there, but something compelled me to do so. I parked, got my jacket on, geared up and headed up the trail.
The pass is at 10,700 feet and the mountain peak is at 11,900 feet. When I started, I could see that there was still plenty of snow at the top and it looked as though it might impede the hike to the summit.
The higher I climbed, the windier it became. I passed a couple who made it to the snowy section and turned around. They told me that the wind was crazy up there. I soon discovered that they were not telling a lie!
While I did not make it to the top this time, I will be back later in the summer to complete the trek. The good news is that I was able to see some amazing views. The first pic in this post is one of those views.
After completing the partial trek up Bald Mountain, I drove over the Bald Mountain Pass down into the Mirror Lake area. I decided to go to the trailhead parking lot to do a hike. There is one that goes around the lake and then there were others that journey further into the mountains. I chose the latter.
It was a most wonderful day in the outdoors. I had so much fun and look forward to going back, finishing the mountain and exploring new trails and lakes!
The Umenum 