Adventuring {June Hikes}

Phew!  What a month for hiking!  We got out at least twice a week and sometimes more.  Lots of familiar favorite trails and a few new ones, too.

5 June 2018: Paper Airplane Trail at Powder Mountain.  A Monday Night Hike on Tuesday, and one of our all-time favorite trails around.  It's got aspens, flowers, views, a new "tree house" platform to climb and dance on, and a giant metal paper airplane sculpture at the end.  So much to love!

"Mom, I'm caution taping."  (Ha - now it's a verb!)

Papa bird feeding his little baby birdies.

bonus video!

"tricks"

It's a dusty trail, and we always end up looking
a bit like this.

Checking out the new "treehouse" that has
been finished along the trail just this year.
It's a favorite place to stop and run/dance around
on.

6 June 2018: Quail Trail Loop (Tyke Hike #2).  This one is always a hit with the kiddos, featuring rocks to climb on, "tree tunnels", tons of bridges, and balancing on boards through the marshy parts.  It's even better to do it with friends!

Prestin, Charleigh, Cal and Sam
(these guys were leading the pack - practically
running ahead of everyone else while we hiked).

Watchin' the bugs.

All the kids (well, most of them).

Group shot!  (I'm loving this addition to our weekly hikes)
Kim, Cruze, Missy, Madden, Caleb (backwards), Ezra, Marin,
Callie, Claire, Sam, Henry, McKenzie, Chrissy, Annabel, Alicia,
Charleigh, Treasa and Prestin.  (Not pictured, Caleb's grandparents
and baby sister Brooke (and dog, Sochi).)

11 June 2018: Mule Ear Trail in North Fork Park.  This is a new trail for us.  We've hiked on the other side of the loop (the Mule Shoe Trail) a few times, but never have ventured on this one till now.  I LOVED it!  The flowers were incredible!  We totally lucked out with the timing, for sure.  Rather than making it an out and back, we had Gregg drop us off at the start, then he drove up the road to the parking lot where we'd end, and rode my bike back down to us (and parked it in a bush until we came back down in the car on the way home).  It worked out perfectly.  We took the overlook side trail at the top, and while we didn't go all the way to the end of that, we did find a bench to eat dinner on with a great view of the valley.  Callie hiked the entire time - nearly 3 miles!  It's been fun to slowly amp up our mileage again on these family hikes as the kids' legs get a little stronger.

This is where its name comes from!

Cute little purple flower Cal asked me to take a photo of.

bonus video!

"hiking up with Sam"

Getting tired as we near the top of the climb.

That dirt loop down yonder is the parking lot where our car is.

Our overlook bench for dinner.

Overlook group shot.

I mean, really!  It was glorious!

It got really shady and lush on the downhill side.

bonus video!

"hiking down with Sam"

NOT a pretty flower pic - more of an "ewwy"
caterpillar pic.

Cal's still trompin', but Sam biffed it and got
some scraped knees and was sad, so Gregg carried
him the rest of the way.

Someone need a bath, eh?

13 June 2018: Sardine Peak Trail at the Maples Trailhead at Snowbasin.  Another lovely morning for a hike with friends (and then a good hour of play at the playground afterwards).

Another request from Cal to take a picture of
a flower.

Bluebird day!

Our destination: the beaver pond!

My friend snapped this one of Cal rocking
Minnie by the pond.  So sweet.

Group shot! Kim, Miles, Maya, Moriah, Caralee,
Callie, Sam, Alicia, Annabel, Henry, Treasa,
Prestin, Charleigh.

We love this playground!

The kids were playing "work" - and that's what
Sam is doing (imagine typing sounds coming
from his fingers as it hits that rock).

They played in these trees forever.  It was fun to watch their
imaginations going wild.

14 June 2018: Spawn Creek Trail in Logan Canyon (at the Temple Fork Trailhead).  Heather invited us to join her on this one, so we made an early drive to Logan to meet up with her and Grace, plus my mom and some Thornley cousins and Shelly and her kids.  It was a fun family group on a cool trail that ended at some gigantic beaver dams!  We all seemed to be terrible allergic to the sage brush or grass or something around us, though.  Many many tissues (and then wipes when we ran out of tissues) were used by many in the hiking of this trail!

Group shot!  Mom/Grandma/Aunt Peggy, Cal, Peter, Evelyn,
Heather, Grace, Adam, Perry, Kim, Sam.  (Shelly headed back
to the car to ease Bradley's anger - he is a not a fan of the hiking
carriers, apparently.)

Isn't that awesome?!

Plenty of lap for all.  (And this is likely where
I lost Sam's sunglasses for the last time.)

Back down we go.

We were hypothesizing that this hole was an
entrance to that beaver lodge.  But who knows?

18 June 2018: Brim Trail at Powder Mountain.  This one was a brand new one to us.  My friend Alicia told me this morning at the library that she liked to bike it and it would probably make a great Tyke Hike.  I told Gregg about it at lunch and we decided we'd check it out for our Monday Night Hike that evening.  Which we did.  As we hiked through the cool aspens and bounteous wildflowers (so much white columbine and blue penstemon!), I decided that, indeed, our Wednesday Tyke Hike would indeed be on this trail.  We loved it.

Don't know what these are, but I really liked them.

We love to hike through aspen!

Even paintbrush!!

After the flowery woods part, it opens up to this big meadow
with an awesome view of Pineview below.  So many heart eyes!

Picnic on a rock.  We've had a lot of these this summer.

One of those far peaks is Ben Lomond.

Apple pie on a dirt trail on top of a mountain.
Doesn't get better than that.

Awww.

20 June 2018: Back on the Brim Trail.  The kids and moms (and dad) who came on this hike loved it just as much as we did on Monday.

Small group, but a great group: Missy, Cruze, Madden, Chrissy,
McKenzie, Kim, Sam, Callie (and Bryan, Chrissy's husband, was
our photographer, not pictured).

I'm pretty sure those two prominent peaks yonder
are Ben Lomond and Willard Peaks (but maybe
I should climb up there someday and find out for
sure?).

We met up with Lupita and her girls, Zoey, Nora, and Jane
as we headed back.  (She was over an hour late getting up there
for our hike since her girls slept in that morning.)

Cute kids in the woods: McKenzie, Cruze, Madden, Sam and Cal.

25 June 2018: Hidden Lake Hike (via Burntwood and Three Mile ski trails) on Powder Mountain.  Another new trail for us (also suggested/mentioned by my friend Alicia) on a Monday Night Hike.  This one was actually on the ski mountain, so we followed the wide road down till we got to Hidden Lake.  We love the views from Powder on that side looking down into Cache Valley.  Such a beautiful place!  And the wildflowers can't be beat at these high elevations.  (Neither can the temps - we found ourselves heading up there  a LOT to watch our thermometer drop 20 degrees as we climbed!)

Be still my heart!

First sight of the lake.

Well now, if that ain't purdy!

Dinner on the shores.

We gave the cows who were grazing around
the lake a wide berth.

Dusty Paintbrush.

Oh!  How I love it!

Cheetohs - hiking fuel of Blanchards.

A special chairlift rest post-hike.

27 June 2018: Birdsong Trail at the Mouth of Ogden Canyon.  We had another big group show up to hike this one with us.  We didn't hike far - probably half a mile or less, but the kids loved to play in the little "waterfall" and climb up the dirt and tree stumps.  That shady spot (with a bench) is a fine destination when you're hiking with tykes.

Erin and Charlie, Kim and Henry (Alicia's son), Lupita and
Jane, Nora and Zoey, Treasa and Prestin and Charleigh, Alicia
and Annabel and Sam and Cal (my kids), Annalissa and Lincoln
and Azaela and Anahlia, Annalissa's mom (who I never learned
her name), and Sadie and Lincoln and Charlotte and Lily.
Whew!

Like I said, they had a blast!