Double Waterfall Day

Sam was out of town this week, but I still wanted to try a new trail anyway.  So I decided to make today a double waterfall day and hit both the Adams canyon waterfall in Layton as well as Waterfall Canyon in Ogden.  I started over in Adams Canyon.  I have used this trail as a staple of my training this year, and have thus done it more than a dozen times.  Usually it takes me between 50 and 55 minutes.  Today I started a little before sunrise at 5:35am, and it was quite dark for the first 20 minutes, slowing me down somewhat.  I finished trailhead to waterfall to trailhead in 53:48.  Three minutes behind my best time.  Once I finished that, I drove 20 minutes north to the Waterfall canyon trail.  Since I've never done this trail before, I wasn't quite sure what to expect.  The trail was shorter than I was led to believe, but it made up for it with a steady incline the whole 1.25 miles to the waterfall.  My in and out time was 42:10, but that was hardly a competitive effort. 

Adams Canyon Waterfall

Waterfall Canyon... is my chin really that gray?

Dueling Banjos - Olympus Style

For Pioneer day, I decided to take on Olympus again.  Most trail runs are timed from trailhead to summit to trailhead.  But because of the nature of the 600' scramble at the top, we don't like to rush ourselves going back down, and thus make our focus on how fast we can summit this mountain.

I wasn't too sure how well I'd do after the terrible last 4 weeks I've had, I gave it my all to try to beat Sams time from 10 days ago.  I started out power hiking most of the way to the first creek bed, and running whenever my legs and the trail would allow.  I shaved a minute and a half off of my best time to the creek bed.  However, I couldn't keep that pace.  I was still on course to beat my best time until I reached the endless staircase.  In the end, I finished about 5 minutes behind my best time for my third best summit time ever.

32:02 to the creekbed
51:00 to the saddle from the creek bed.
15:24 to the summit from the saddle.
1:38:26 total time to summit

Rainbow in the background. It rained a few drops.

Same fallen tree from Sams post..

Even though I counted about 60 people on the mountain going down, I had the summit all to myself.

Summer Trail Series IV - Gobblers Knob

This week we decided to take on Gobblers Knob again via the Alexander Basin trail.  We brought along our new best friend, Jake, who lives in Sam's neighborhood.  And to reward him for keeping up with us, we have given him a big fat 4our name of "O'Devil."  Yup... pretty sweet.

The last time we went on this trail was our first outing with the snow shoes. This time we figured it'd be much easier to hike on the trail instead of above it.  We had read that this trail was somewhat steep, but that is an understatement.  It was an astonishing 1370 vertical feet per mile, with it's peak at 10,164 feet.  In comparison, Lone Peak averages 1000 feet per mile and Kings Peak only 600.  The trail was a little overgrown, which makes for some pretty wet shorts after a night of rain, but overall it was easy to follow.  Approaching the summit was more rocky and quite steep.

About halfway up Sam and Jake had to tell me to stop and look up.  Good thing, because I was about 25 feet from the moose standing in the middle of the trail.  He ran a little bit further up the trail, and we waited patiently for him to give us enough clearance that we felt safe we wouldn't get corn-holed from behind as we walked past.

The summit has one of the prettiest views I've seen from a wasatch peak.

Some comparison shots from today compared to our last trip up this trail.

Our friend the moose.  This was taken after the moose moved a safe distance away.

Alexander Basin, about a half mile to the summit.

Steve and Jake on Gobblers Knob summit.

Sam on Summit

Moose was still where we left him on the way back down.

Thought I saw another moose there... guess not.

Stats

Olympus

What's that lurking behind the tree stump? Wait, it's nothing. I didn't see any Huffs in the wild today.

Poor Steve had a sinus infection so I did Olympus solo today. It showed too. I didn't have Steve to pull me along on the never-ending-staircase so my summit time was not as good as usual. Of course, other factors may have been the amount of smoke in the air from the Tooele fire, the fact that it was close to 80 degrees when I started at 5:30 am, and I am just a lot slower at climbing anyway.

37:28 mins. to the river
56:41 mins. to the saddle from the river
17:33 mins. to the summit from the saddle
1:51:44 total time to summit

Sam on the summit. See the haze in the air?

Looking north-east.

Summer Trail Series 3 - Ben Lomond

Steve, with the summit in the background.

Ben Lomond is situated in the Wasatch Mtns. in North Ogden. It was named after a mountain in Scotland by early Scottish settlers. It has an elevation of 9,712'. Several trails lead up to it. A little more than a year ago we tried the east trail in early spring and ended up hiking, not very far, in the snow. In late March of this year we snowshoed up the south, or the Skyline Trail about five miles. For more information go here.

Today we took the Skyline Trail all the way to the top. It was just under 8 miles to the summit and we did it in just over 2 hours. The trail was very beautiful and fairly easy to run on. You can see the stats below, but we did the whole thing up and back (about 15.6 miles) in 3 hrs. 48 mins. As a side note, we came across something we never have before--a dirt bike on the trail.

Sam, with Ben Lomond washed out on the left.

"Hey, don't take any more pictures of my butt."

Yet another rare siting of a Huff in the wild.

Steve on the summit with Willard Bay in the background.

Sam, with Pineview Reservoir in the background.

Running down, with Willard Peak in the background.