Hiking Timp
On the last day of our Utah trip, Scott and I hiked up Mt. Timpanogos. We had been told that there would be snow from the previous bad winter and that rangers would encourage us to wear crampons and carry ice axes, but how bad could it be, right? The first hour of our hike was great - wildflowers by a nice dirt/rock switchback trail. It was beautiful!
We passed lots of waterfalls.
Up higher on the mountain, we found the snow. It looks so small here...
...but as we got closer, we realized it covered quite a bit of the trail.
We crossed a few snowfields, bushwhacked on the other side looking for the trail, turned around after a few hours, and headed back down.
By then, the snow had been in the sun for a few hours and was really soft. Scott and I resorted to the tripod technique pictured above, where we kicked toeholds and used a hand to hang on for dear life. My hand saved me at least a few times; once I slid a few feet and quickly grabbed a rock (which thankfully wasn't as loose as the others!). I was so glad to get to solid ground again that we ran down the rest of the trail, which made me very sore for a few days - but it was so fun.
We didn't summit, but it was a beautiful hike.
posted by Emily at 8:30 AM
3 Comments:
We loved hiking in those mountains. I glad you guys had a nice trip. Too bad we didn't make it out there like we hoped.
Hopefully you got to relax, catch up on a little sleep, and now feel rejuvinated.
Glad you had a good time. When I was in college a few people wanted to hike Timp under similar conditions, but I was too scared. I'm sure it was beautiful (and I have climbed Mt Timp before when there wasn't snow on the path).
Thanks for your blog post. My daughter has been wanting to make this hike and we have been trying to figure out the current conditions. Sounds like we better wait a little while longer. Hopefully it melts some more this year.
Post a Comment
<< Home