Trying to hike Mount Timpanogos

My really good friend Natalie flew out from Virginia for a week and asked if I would like to hike Mount Timpanogos with her.  OF COURSE I said yes!  I've always wanted to hike it too, and with Natalie it would be awesome!  

But Mount Timp beat us back with the snowpack and we didn't make it.  Ruff.  But we did manage to hike to the same elevation twice.   Oops.  

We were all prepared and started our hike at 6 AM to beat the heat--only it was snowy not hot.


And then we came to the avalanche area. There was a late spring avalanche this last spring and it was CRAZY to hike through.  Wow!  And we lost the trail...



And then we found a trail for a bit and then we bushwhacked through the shrubs a bit and then climbed straight up over the scree and snowfields.
Gorgeous waterfalls and beautiful view!!!
There's my snow-packed Uintas off on the horizon!


Eventually we got as high as we could go without snow pick shoes and ice axe.  So we headed back down.
 

And then we found the trail again, only I didn't think it was, but google maps assured us we were.  Anyway, we started following it up again and then attached ourselves to a poor innocent hiker who had hiked it before many times (a BYU football coach actually) but he was really nice and listened to our chatter the whole time.  
Eventually we hit the point in the trail that we couldn't go further on--in fact it was exactly across from where we had gotten to the first time.  See the X, that's where we were the first time.

So we hiked back down and ate our lunch at Bridal Veil Falls and then decided to go on the ski lift at Sundance.




Only once we got there, we found out they had a four course zipline and courtesy of Natalie's ex-husband and alimony we treated ourselves to it.  Probably the most adventurous thing I've ever done in my life.  IT WAS SO FUN!!!!  I loved it.  By the end and the longest one we had figured out how to go fast and not twist (keep your legs tucked up) and we were comfortable with it and we never braked the entire time. Then we went out to Cafe Rio.  Yum yum.

It was a fabulous day with my friend!