Millcreek Canyon

The air is getting cooler. We prob only have two good days of riding this week - yesterday and today. Yesterday morning, I hesitated and Corey left. Then I decided to go and drove to the trailhead in time to meet him when he arrived there. He biked up to the ruins, I did techy twice. I like techy. The forecast showed there was going to be rain in the valley tomorrow, and snow in the mountains. Knowing this, last night Corey and I planned to finally ride Wasatch Crest. This was our first time on "Crest". Corey's been eyeing it since Park City last year when we were dropped off at Guardsman. As we prepared to bike down to the Mountainside Resort, Corey commented "There's another trail that will take you down to Skyline! There's a part of it called 'Puke Hill!!!'" Well that did not sound interesting to me then, but I also wasn't too confident in my biking. But I've gotten pretty good at Techy this summer, and I just learned that Techy is a black diamond (Corey's was like "Well yeah, obviously!") So I was feeling like I could probably handle Crest. We woke up with purpose, unlike yesterday (not our usual "you wanna go?" today), we both got ready, and headed to pick up Corey's dad at 6:40. The three of us drove up to Guardman's, thanked the Lord for safety and prayed that it would continue, and then Wayne was on his way back down the canyon. He took Corey's car back to his house, and we set off for a biking adventure. We were on the trail around 8. Beautiful views of Brighton and the Wasatch mountains!

First segment was Scotty's Bypass, which was so lovely. I'm glad we were able to do that, and then it was the infamous Puke Hill. Corey rode up the whole thing!! He paused a few times (to keep me company as I walked my bike) but he was on his bike the whole time. AMAZING. Of course, his bike is carbon fiber and mine is aluminum, so mine is heavier... maybe I could have done it with a carbon fiber bike. Corey joked at the top "You've proven your worthiness... we can get you a carbon fiber frame". Yay. Also, I was biking it pretty ok until I realized that I hadn't turned on my Strava. That was half way up "puke hill". Then I thought "what's the point of pushing myself hard if it's not even getting recorded!?!?" so I got off and walked a bit. It was also super intimidating to be so out of breath but to be looking up the hill to see that there was still soooo much to go. One comment on Trailsfork, left by Fast44 in July 2017, summed up my feeling nicely: "Puke Hill is an abomination. So many new trails going in to the Park City area, and there is no option for rerouting off this crap climb to one of the best sections of singletrack in the entire country? Pinecone ridge from park City is one of the best climbs around, but not all climbers are coming from Park City, probably more from SLC, leaving Puke Hill a wart on the ass of an otherwise otherworldly ride." I thought that was really funny. So up the wart we went. Most of it was pretty self evident. There was a lot of up hill on the whole ride. I guess I was surprised at that. I figured since we were starting at Guardsman pass, it would be mostly downhill, but nope. Corey had his phone set up in a little carrier thing on his frame, so he could see the map as he rode, so I erroneously just trusted where he was telling me to go. AND because of that, when he told me to take a left, I did, without looking at my map. Thus he lead me down two black diamond trails, Millcreek Meadows and Little Water descent. 

Next time I will not just trust his word. I will know where I am going! Also, after we reached the Millcreek Upper Parking lot, he didn't know where the trail was, so after that we never got back on the Great Western Trail or Pipeline, :( we ended up just taking the road the rest of the way down. So that was a little sad, cause we probably missed the most beautiful and fun downhill part of the ride and it was prob our last chance this year, but it also felt like we had already been gone forever, so it was good to just stay on the road to hurry to Wayne's. 

Since it was our first time riding this trail, and we didn't know what was coming up next, everything felt new and unexpected and it felt like a longer ride than it actually was. The road was fast, and the air was cold, so I was kinda freezing for the last 8 miles and 26 minutes until we got into the sunlight. It was good to be on the road and not be worried about watching the trail. 

That made it so I was able to look up and really see all the fall colors! WOW!

So today's ride was two hours long. For both of us, today was our longest ride at 22 miles! I decided we need to get up here one more time before the snow and rain this week. On the drive home, I said I'd buy hot dogs and smores for a cook out tonight. 

Owen has become a biker. He rides his bike to school everyday with a group of neighborhood boys who all want to ride. It's less of a hassle for him to ride the bus, but what parent wouldn't love that their kid wants to exercise and go on a ride? So a group of moms helps take them to school and watch when they come home. We help them cross the busy road, cause even with a crosswalk and flashing light, people still drive crazy fast and just cruise by! A bus even got hit last month!! So it's a bit nuts. If a bus can get hit, a kid sure can. So today I was there to greet the kids as they were riding home. 

And I told them to go home and get ready, cause we were going for a cookout! Up in the mountains! I told Owen and Daniel that they were going to miss soccer practice, sorry! and Natalie that she was going to miss activity days, sorry! 'cause this is an important moment! We are having a cookout in the mountains! Our first time ever! And probably our last chance this year too. Well, it's prob my third time ever, but the first three happened before the blog, so no one probably remembers those. I've been up here I think three times in my life that I can remember. Once post high school when I hiked with Corey and friends to Granger peak, once with the Dahl's in 2014 we started a hike to Granger Peak, but that was with lots of little ones and it got dark before we got very far. And I think we came up here prob 15 years ago for a cookout with Wride's and Stroheim's. Corey said he came up a lot as a kid, and he wanted to revisit the area they usually went, so he pulled over at the Church Fork picnic area. Like 10 minutes into making the fire, Wesley needed to leave to go to a friend's mission call opening. 

We left his car at the Park N ride area so that we wouldn't have to pay for 3 cars, so after I took him back to the jeep he's borrowing from Mark, he took off and I came back into the canyon. I felt like going on a drive, so I passed Church fork to look again at the different picnic areas. And wow! They've got Upper Box Elder picnic area, White Bridge picnic area, terraces, maple cove, and evergreen picnic areas... They've got pipeline trail and birch hollow trail... So much to do up Millcreek Canyon! And I've hardly seen any of it despite attending 6 years of school just 5 minutes away from it. I was a bit in awe. I promised myself that we are going to come up here a lot next year. Like every Monday! Here is Wes making the fire. We invited Wayne to join us. Daniel and Owen playing in the creek - 

It's so good to be out in nature! Peter enjoying a smore behind Abi. 

Fall leaves everywhere all around us! It was lovely!

Katharine doesn't have shoes. So I put socks on her, but she kept taking them off. 

Peter enjoying a smore. 

Abi Lily and Sophi hearing stories from Grandpa. 

Kids still jumping rocks by the creek. 

I wasn't worried about the creek - it was shallow and calm. I took Katharine on a walk along the trail to see the other picnic areas.

It was great. I'm glad that we took the ride on Crest this morning to inspire us to get outside again this evening, and that the seed was planted this last Saturday. After it got dark, we shared a scriptures and had family prayer in the mountains, then Corey went to work a bit more at his dad's house, and I'm here blogging and getting the kids in bed. I love our Wasatch mountains, we are so lucky to live here. Hopefully even with the snow coming tomorrow, we'll see have a week or two to enjoy the reds and yellows around us.