The trail starts at the mouth of Rock Canyon, which was one of my favorite haunts as a kid.  It seems like I was up there all the time once I was able to drive.  My best friend David and I even started to get into rock climbing a little bit, playing in some of the easier routes.  I don’t think I’ve been in Rock Canyon more than once or twice in the last ten years.

I forget what a remarkable place I live in.  Here is a terrifically beautiful place, right in my backyard, and how often do I remember to go and enjoy it?  It’s been great to get back in the mountains a little more.  Click the link below to see all the pictures.

The trail climbs steadily up Rock Canyon.  As you get higher, the trees increase, and you walk closer to the stream.  Soon, there’s a left turn up the First Left Fork of the canyon.  Here the trail becomes more heavily wooded and steepens.  We didn’t see any large fauna, but insects and spiders were abundant.  I saw many species of butterfly, and the same little wolf spiders racing around.  Jim spotted a female with her egg sac, and I snapped a picture.  I really like wolf spiders; an interesting species.  The mothers carry the egg sac with them everywhere, and the spiderlings will hitch a ride with her after they hatch until they’re old enough to go on their own.  Here’s the picture:

There was an abundance of caterpillars as well; they were dangling from the trees all across the trail, and were an amusing annoyance.  I felt covered in their sticky silk by the time we cleared the trees and entered into the beautiful meadow (see below).

We’d worn the dogs out by this time, so I left Jim here and went on alone.  From this meadow, it’s another half mile and 400-500 feet of elevation to the summit.  The day was beautiful and clear, a striking contrast to conditions two weeks ago on Provo Peak.  I could see perhaps 50 miles in all directions.  There were paragliders taking advantage of thermals (you may be able to make one out in the photo below).

At the summit, I took pictures of the nearby mountains.  The visibility was excellent.  Here’s Provo Peak, just to the East:

Looking south, here’s Y Mountain in the foreground and, with Spanish Fork Peak and Mt. Nebo in the distance:

To the North-East, Mt. Cascade looks like a difficult peak to attempt:

And looking North, the Timpanogos massif and Lone Peak further in the distance:

Here I am at the summit (I am pretty sweaty; unusually muggy for Utah yesterday).  You can see Utah Lake in the distance and BYU below me; the Provo Temple is on the right.

Had this view on the hike back down.  All the flowers were blooming, the sun was on the lake, the sky was clear.  It was a stunning scene.

Poor Jim had to carry his fat old dog several times on the way back:

So Thursday morning, Isaac and I set out for Arches National Park.  It’s not the best for mountains, but it’s accessible in this cold spring.  When we set out, we had a solid foot of new snow; I had to put Grandpa’s truck in four wheel drive to get out of our driveway.  Things were sloppy on US 6 through Spanish Fork Canyon and on into Price as well.
 

That little Toyota is probably the finest piece of 20th-century automotive technology.  While it’s a little underpowered and noisy at any kind of speed, it’s pretty near indestructible.  With 275,000+ miles on it, it’s still sporting the original clutch, transmission, and motor.  On top of that, any trail I’ve thrown it at (and I confess I haven’t gone too nuts) has been no problem.  There are some quirks; as we hit Soldier Summit, the right side wiper popped off.  A helpful clerk at Checker Auto in Price got us the right part (these pick-ups don’t have j-hooks for the wipers, so you need an adapter) and got us on the road again.

When we got to Arches, Isaac and I headed up to Delicate Arch.  Isaac is a chatty kid when he wants to be, and he had questions and thoughts about everything.  I use a pair of trekking poles when I hike, and when they’re not extended, they’re just the right size for him to use.  He calls them “hikers”, and talks about how the help us not to fall over.  Any time we’d go up a hill or along a ledge, he’d talk about how we were helping each other not fall.  We would look for the cairns of stones

Isaac is a good hiker.  Delicate Arch is 1.5 miles each way, and he did just fine.

After we hiked to Delicate Arch, we went down and roamed around in the Double Arch area.  He was a pretty fearless climber there, and scrambled all over the rocks.

The GPS recommended the Willow Springs road to get out of the park, and I figured since we had the truck, we could give it a try.  It was very bouncy, and by this time, the boy was very tired.  Even going slow there were a few obstacles that tilted the truck a lot or bounced it.  Once we hit pavement again, though, he got a nap in.  Then it was off for home.

Charlotte wanted to see some fish, so we went to the aquarium in Sandy.  It was very crowded, and while they had a few nice displays, it was just a little underwhelming.  Charlotte still liked it, though.  She especially liked one of the Amazon displays, where they had little caiman, turtles, and fish swimming together.  I showed her an octopus; it made her very nervous, though.  When we were done with the aquarium, I took her to Cabella’s so she could look at a lot of fish without a crowd.  She fell asleep on the way up and on the way back, so I didn’t push it; we’ll have lots of times together if I have my way.  Unfortunately, it was really dark in the aquarium, so my pictures didn’t work out well.  Here’s one of Charlotte helping me admire a spider.