Pioneer Day 2010

Today is July 24th in Utah which is our state holiday commemorating the entry of Brigham Young and the first group of pioneers into the Salt Lake Valley (1847).

I learned that the Pioneer era is generally considered to have ended with the 1869 arrival of the transcontinental railroad.

So, what did we do on this day? Joe and I first drove up Little Cottonwood Canyon (above our house). We drove about 10 miles, parked and took a shuttle the rest of the way up. This was just because of the unusual amount of people, caused by a holiday.

We were let out at the Secret (also spelled Cecret) lake trail head. We joined the small mob of people walking up to the lake. It only takes about 30 minutes. It's steep but still pretty easy to get to.

So how do a couple of people escape the tourists and families with little kids?

For starters, we climbed up to Secret Lake Saddle. About half way up the mountainside, I stopped to look down at the lake.

Then we continued:

After getting over the saddle and walking a short distance I spotted this little badger. He was very calm and unafraid of us.

Further on we started to walk through some meadows:

May be some Mountain Bluebells mixed in here:

Some of the pink shades may be Alpine Paintbrush:

We climbed higher and were finally rewarded with this backside view of Mount Timpanogas:

Just Me:

We were very close to Sugar Loaf peak here, but we didn't want to climb any higher. We took in the views and started back down.

Instead of returning the hard way, we followed easy ski roads.

Here's just another mountain off in the distance:

This is called High Traverse; one of the ski lifts:

We made some stops along the way and just enjoyed ourselves. Eventually we were back at Secret Lake and then we took the same trail down that we had come up on. This trail went through some huge fields of wildflowers:

A last look back:

We had a short wait for the shuttle which took us down the mountainside to our car.

So what did all of you do for Pioneer Day?