easiest ten miles ever

On Sunday we met up with our friend Ted, who is a very recent transplant to Utah.  He had a condo at Canyons for years - but now lives in Kamas - so he suggested a hike on Rob's Trail in the general Canyons area.  We thought that sounded like a great idea: we had last been there in July 2018 and we knew Milton was allowed on the trails there.

 Nicely shaded for much of the hike

We all convened at the busy trailhead around 9 a.m.; although this was a later start than we usually aim for, most of the trail is shaded, at least until you get up on the ridge, so we weren't too worried about the heat.  And I cannot say enough about the Park City trails - they are so wonderful to walk on, mostly rock-free packed dirt.  It was dusty because there's been no rain but the ground is very comfortable under foot.

 A veritable bouquet (columbine, paintbrush, asters and more)

The sign at the trailhead said dogs needed to be leashed but once we were several switchbacks up, and had met about a dozen unleashed dogs, we let Milton run free.  He seems to stick closer to the trail in wooded areas (as opposed to how far-ranging he'll go out in the desert where he can more easily see us), occasionally charging off into the underbrush after the cheeky squirrels.  These are multi-use trails - meaning hikers and MTBers must share - and Milt did much better about staying out of the way of the MTBers we met.  He was his usual charming self, garnering several compliments ("That's a great-looking dog!") and pats throughout the day.  Everyone loves Milton.

 Don't recognize this one

The wildflowers were phenomenal out there: lupine, fireweed, horsemint, columbine, paintbrush, scarlet gilia, purple asters and more whose names I forget.  Seeing those flowers put an urge in me to get up to Little Cottonwood Canyon to see the blooms there before they fade.

 Horsemint (or maybe catmint)

At the first intersection, we turned right, heading to the ridge above the drainage we'd just come out of.  Our plan had been to make a loop, either via Yeti's Trail or Moose Puddle, but we didn't have good maps; as we descended Yeti's towards the Utah Olympic Park, we really seemed to be going further out of our way than we wanted.  After some discussion, we decided to just go back the way we came, because it was a known quantity and also mostly shaded.  This proved to be a good idea because Milton finished his water just as we finished climbing back up to the ridge.

The sun was strong out from under the trees

We got back to the cars around 1:00 p.m., having done 10+ miles - rather more than we thought we would do when we started out.  But with those cushy Park City trails underfoot, it was definitely one of the easiest ten-milers we've ever done.

Hike stats: to be updated but we did over 10 miles