so, here's your up

We reconfigured our hiking for Sunday: backing off the distance just a little but adding a lot of climbing.  It has become slightly challenging to find longer, local hikes that are not full of butt-kicking elevation (Timpanogos, I'm looking at you, and also Lone Peak, which we still haven't tackled).  So we went back to a route we've done for the last couple of years and tackled Alta Dry Fork - Mineral Basin/Snowbird once again.

Love this view of Timpanogos from

the Sunset pass, looking into Alta Dry Fork

Because we only had to drive up to Snowbird, we slept in, getting up at 5 a.m. instead of the 4:30 wake-up call that the last two Sundays have brought.  We ate our breakfasts of PB&J rollups in the car, snagged a parking spot at Snowbird's Entry 2 - that early, there are plenty from which to choose - and started walking up the canyon road towards Alta by 6 a.m.  Both times we've done this hike before have been in August so it was still dark when we started; this time, closer to the solstice, the sun was just hitting the peaks above us and it was light enough to see.  I still wore my arm warmers and gloves, however, and was glad to have them.

Rocky? Check.  Loose? Check.  Steep?  Check.

We walked up the road to Alta, then continued up through Albion Basin to the Catherine's Pass trail head where I shed my gloves and arm warmers.  It had taken us a good hour to get to the Summer Road from where we had parked.  This is what makes this hike deceptively long, these stretches.  It takes an hour to get to Alta; it takes roughly an hour and a half to get up to Sunset pass; it takes roughly an hour and a half to get all the way down Dry Fork to start going up again; it takes about an hour to climb back up out of Mineral Basin.

Still green on the backside of Devil's Castle

There were just a few other hikers on the way up to Catherine's Pass and once we got beyond there, we didn't see anyone else, other than some campers, until we got to the top of Hidden Peak at Snowbird.  The way down Dry Fork was, as it always is, steep, loose and rocky, but it was also very green, with wildflowers everywhere.  There were whole fields of pale pink geraniums and we even got buzzed by a curious hummingbird.

Pausing for refreshment before the final UP

It was around 10:30 a.m. on the American Fork Canyon side and campers were stirring, having finished up breakfast.  A number of ATVs and dirt bikes shared the rocky river bed/road with us for a little while but we were headed up further than they and soon left them behind.  For me, this was really the only hot section of the hike.  That cold front that had moved in was still in effect and with the very cool, almost chilly breeze blowing, temperatures were quite pleasant, even in the sun.

Looking back into Mineral Basin from whence we came

That being said, it was still a long slog up to Mineral Basin.  The dirt road has deteriorated in the last couple of years and it was rockier and more rutted than I remembered.  Taking our boots off to wade across the little American Fork river down below had felt wonderful and rejuvenating for a while, but later that evening, both H and I would feel the toll the rocks had taken on our feet and legs.

Map (not pictured: tram ride down)

We paused at the bottom of Mineral Basin to reapply sunscreen and down some calories.  And then it was nothing but uphill to the finish.  Since the wildflowers have not come out in force yet, the incidental tourist-hikers have not come out either and we saw no one the whole way up until just below the top of Hidden Peak, when the MTBers were coming down.  Well, we did see a very funny marmot near the Baldy chair: he lay flat on the ground, trying to avoid notice, but when we stopped to watch him, he took off running, climbed the ladder and disappeared into the coping of the chairlift.

More up than down on this one

While I didn't keep pace with H for the final climb, I did manage to keep him in sight the whole way up.  We sat on the decking in the shade, waiting for a tram down and enjoying the brisk 57 F temperature.  It didn't take long for us to stiffen up, to be honest, and when we finally got home - we stopped for a while on the Snowbird patio to listen to some live music while we replenished calories and liquids from our cooler - both of us were feeling the effects of the distance + elevation.  I find as I get older, it isn't the doing of things that is more difficult, it's the recovering from doing things that gets me.

Hike stats:  14.64 miles (not including tram ride down); 5:50 hiking time at 2.5 avg. m.p.h. / 6:57 total time; 5,023' elevation.