Hiking, part 4

Week 8 - Aspen Crest camping

This week the girls went on a hike at their church girls' camp, and on the weekend there was a church family overnight camp. So we didn't do a family hike, but we did get to enjoy the outdoors and the cool mountain air.

In the morning, T. went on a short walk with Mike and me up a trail by the campsite. For some reason the girls felt they'd had enough hiking for the week.

Week 9 - Lake Mary - moderate

Back up to Brighton to beat the summer heat. It's amazing how you can drive less than an hour and have the temperature drop so noticeably. Gorgeous scenery and clean air - this is one of my favorite places.

That clean air is also thinner up there, and one of us had a somewhat hard time because of that. The trail is well maintained but has a pretty steady climb and is steep in places with a little bit of scrambling over rocks. We took it slow, though, and eventually we all made it up to the lake.

Here's M., A., and T. starting back down.

We went through several patches of wildflowers and noticed this bee doing her job. (I also learned that if I'm going to take a bunch of photos of flowers, looking for just the right shot, I should probably do it toward the beginning of the hike and not the end when others are tired and just want to get back to the car!)

Week 10 - Parley's Nature Park - Easy

This week we had planned to hike to a reservoir in a canyon, but clouds were gathering and as we left the house it started to rain. It didn't seem like a mountainside near water would be a smart place to be if the storm got worse, so we quickly changed our plans and stayed in the valley. This is a popular trail for dog owners, which added to the enjoyment for us, since the only one in our family who doesn't like dogs was at work. (And a good thing too -- we saw a lot of dogs that day.)

The trail runs next to a freeway, but after the first little while you wouldn't know it at all. You go down into a hidden canyon and you feel like you're far away from the city.

We got rained on, but not too much, and it was great to still get our hike in despite the weather. We'll go up to that reservoir another time.