Last week I went on a 4 day camping / hiking trip with some family. It was amazing. We camped at the Trial Lake campground which as the name suggests, was right next to Trial Lake (one of the 20 or so lakes in the park). We were at roughly 10,000 feet at the campground. The view of the lake in front of miles of pine trees and mountain peaks was surreal. Tuesday we hiked from bald mountain up to meadow lake. Then took the trail up to "The Notch" and back down the other side ending up back at our campground at Trial Lake. It was a spectacular hike. Not to dificult. I think we covered about 11 miles that day. We saw several people backpacking in to camp for a few days up at meadow lake. While we all agreed that packing in your gear would be fun, we were glad to only be carrying day packs.
Wednesday I stayed at the campsite while everyone else went back up into the lake country on a shorter 6 mile hike that took them up into basically the same area, but on a diferent trail. I enjoyed chopping wood and keeping a fire running all day. I also managed to track down a few birds including a Clark's nutcracker, several white-crowened sparrows, and some red crossbills. We also had a very brave Chipmunk take over our campsite on Wednesday. He would actually jump up in our laps and stand on his back legs and beg for food. I think we ended up giving him about a pound of peanuts.
Wednesday night, Dan, Lena, Cory, Daniel, and I hiked up Bald Mountain starting a little past sunset. By the time we reached the summit it was about as dark as you could imagine. The moonless sky at 12,000 feet is amazing! It was a rough hike to do so late at night, but it was well worth it.
Thursday, my cousin Daniel and I were driving home and just north of Heber, we saw 2 nesting Swainson's Hawks. We pulled over to the side of the road and watched them take off and soar around the feilds together for probably 15 minutes. It was a great finish to a great trip.
