Red Pine

Owen, Daniel, Peter and Katharine joined me for a fall hike this evening, yay I love fall!!!

My brother Neil was texting the family today about going on a fall drive up Guardsman. We each shared some photos from previous years and that woke me up to the reality that time was limited for peak fall colors at the high altitudes. I didn't realize until texting him today that my Red Pine hike last year was in September. For some reason I thought I had until October/General Conference this weekend (prob from the memory of this fall drive in 2018)... don't we still have atleast another week?? ...nope - it's go time NOW! That was all I needed to get myself up into the mountains today. The girls had work and young women's so I told ODPK of my plan and that WE ARE GOING, this one is not optional so get your shoes on. I knew I'd be slower with kids, but we went with enough time for a Katharine paced hike and we made it to the canyon view spot that I wanted to get to. Staring up at 5:30 -

The sun was setting at 7:10 tonight, so I hoped we'd get up to the spot by 6:30 and then head back before it got dark. We stopped to take a pic by the first bright yellow tree we saw, that looked really yellow with the sun shining coming through behind it.

Mount Superior on the other side of the canyon -

Hiking up and up and up.

These four cute kids did great tonight, they were real troopers. After passing the Gloria Falls path, we started to really get into the yellow aspen part of the trail -  

I felt like singing the hills are alive!!! 

It was so pretty!!! Short video of autumn's glory here.

And after an hour of hiking we were at the canyon view spot. Owen took this picture. 

Then I took a picture of them. Great job you awesome kids! 

We had a little snack of cashews at the top, then started back down. Katharine did so good hiking up, I said I'd give her a ride for some of the hike down. 

Owen carried K a little bit too. He and Daniel helped carry the backpacks too, they were good helpers. I thought this view was amazing on our hike down, with the sun still shining on the mountain peak behind the kids, and this orange and yellow aspen between us. 

When we passed the Gloria Falls trail, I asked the kids for a vote if we should hurry and go see the waterfall. Daniel was a hard no, I was carrying Katharine so she didn't get to vote, and Owen and Peter were both willing, so we went over. Daniel refused to be in the pic, but he tried to carry on and was there with us, just spent. 

Ok we can go back now. It was dark by the time we got to the car. 

They did great - 3.91 miles and a total time of 2 hours 5 min. Pretty good and again it was so beautiful. I was grateful they came on a hike with me. I love autumn and I loved spending time walking and talking with my cute kids tonight.