07/29/01 Hiking Summit Trail:
I was going to spend the few days before the doctor's appointment in the Mirror Lake area of the Wasatch-Cache National Forest until I realized I only had a couple of days instead of a few. So here I am in the Mt. Nebo area of the Uinta National Forest instead.
They have or are still moving cows into the National Forest (grazing for a fee). They call this multi-use of a natural resource. I call it anti-people. There's cow crap all over the place. Cow crap all over the roads. Cow crap at the campsites. Cow crap on the trails. And flies and bugs and stink wherever there is cow crap. Pretty disgusting. I won't be back.
I found a fairly clean spot last night at 7700 feet. The cows woke me up about 3am with their mooing and then they really started at dawn. They were at it hot and heavy at dusk too. I drove further up the mountain to the Summit Trail. This is a 6.7 mile (one way) trail but to what summit I dunno. I didn't think I wanted to do a 13-14 mile hike today but figured I'd go out 3-4 miles or so and come back. Especially since I forgot breakfast. That and little sleep should wear me down pretty quickly.
Temperatures in the lower 70's and a 10-20mph wind. The Summit Trail follows the top of a long ridge at 8200 feet. A lot of saddles led the trail up and down, the net elevation change be about zero. Tell my legs that though. Nice views of forested valleys and slopes along the way. I got three miles to the Pages Fork Trail junction. Here I had nice views of Mt. Nebo with snow patches lingering on at 12000 feet. I called it a day then.