Summer 2023, Part 2

For our final preparation for Kings Peak, Max, my friend Michael, and I hiked up Timpanogos. Where Olympus is challenging for how steep it is, Timpanogos is tough because of the distance. We took the Timpooneke Route.

^ It’s fun to see the destination poking up over the parking lot when you start.

^ Those views!

^ Michael wanted in on this one because he was doing Kings with us. And Max adores him, so it’s a great win-win. Spooky snowfield crossing in the top left. Everything else on the trail is super straightforward, but that part was a little cringey. You can also see the track where people were sliding down it (we did not, valuing our bones unbroken).

^ At the saddle before the final push towards the summit.

^ Lunch break! Notice Max brought another friend along (it’s the head of a Ty Beanie-Boo Turtle).

^ View from the saddle of what awaits us. You can see the summit shelter poking out at the top.

^ Victory!

^ The trail looks spicy when you look down on it in a photograph, but it’s not sketchy when you’re on it. Even Max just now said, “I don’t remember that—that looks scary.”

^ The wind at the top was CHILLY. We didn’t stay long.

^ Max drew this little mountain goat on the inside of the summit shelter. The M-cubed stands for Max, Michael, Mark.

^ And then how perfect that we would meet a herd of these critters immediately after!

^ Max, as you can imagine, was elated.

^ Lots of momma and baby goats. I’ve never seen so many that were so comfortable getting so close!

Now some of the few pictures we took at the Lewis Reunion at Bear Lake. Sorry I’ve been so lazy capturing the goings-on these past few years…

^ Aggie ice cream, of course!

^ Chess with Ruth.

^ First beach day.

^ Rainy Limber Pine walk.

^ Morning walks in the Reserve.

^ Second beach day.

^ Cute Gobbler curled up on his bed in the sunflower room at Bearadise.

Though there aren’t a lot of pictures, there are more playing at the beach photos than these. For all interested in downloading them, the link is at the button below.

And if you missed downloading the family portraits we did behind the cabin, you can get them by clicking this button:

After skirting through Wyoming by Evanston, we arrived at the Henry’s Fork trailhead in Northeastern Utah to begin our 3-day journey to the summit of Kings Peak and back. We took the Henry’s Fork Route.

^ Looking down at the Henry’s Fork River…

^ Taking a moment to rest before we cross the river to approach the peak.

^ Crossing the river…

^ Kings Peak is the pyramid-shaped one on the left. This is the same route Ryan and I took two years ago, but this time we were able to enjoy the beauty. Last time we couldn’t see much because of all of the wildfire smoke blowing in from California.

^ Taking a break before cutting off the main trail towards Dollar Lake where we would set up camp.

^ The excellent camp site we found beneath some pines.

^ Meadow by our campsite that leads up to the main trail.

^ On our way to filter water by the lake. This is a good look at how all of the older, more mature trees have been killed by bark beetles, while the younger trees are still thriving and strong.

^ Dollar Lake

^ Out for an evening exploration walk after dinner.

View of the south end of the basin. Kings Peak is the second from the left (it’s behind the closer set of mountains).

^ Posing atop “Kitchen Rock.” Kings is now to the left of Max (off his right shoulder).

^ Those clouds made for some really dynamic skies!

^ Loves being a wild boy.

^ Three moose on the far end of Dollar Lake (they’re tough to spot—look left of center in the frame).

After a pleasant and warm night’s rest (I am sort of kidding… I’m discovering that it’s just impossible for me to sleep well without a proper pillow… it wasn’t a cold night, though), we woke up and prepared for our summit hike.

^ MURCH more scenic than last time.

^ A glorious morning!

^ Flowers of every color and variety.

^ Lots of awesome rocks in astonishing colors and patterns (and the next two).

^ This one is almost like wood.

^ Gaining more elevation to reach Gunsight Pass.

^ Gunsight Pass, 11,873 feet. We didn’t take any pictures for the next bit because (1) we took a wrong turn that led us to hurry more to make up for lost time, and (2) the weather turned sour. Strong wind and hail/rain pelting the face. We considered turning back, but figured we may as well cross the basin we were in to look over the ridge on the other side before the summit push and see what the oncoming weather was like. If it looked scary or if we heard any thunder, we were turning back. Though the weather remained poor all the way to the ridge, the oncoming clouds looked much friendlier and we heard no thunder and saw no lightning, so we felt free to continue to the summit.

^ You can see the basin we crossed behind us and the poor weather we’d trekked through. We lost track of Ryan and Peter when we took a shortcut to get back on trail and they opted to backtrack.

Michael went ahead to the summit on his own at this point as Max and I were deliberating about what to do (he didn’t want to miss it—as a result, you won’t see Michael in the next few pictures). The weather was wearing down Max’s resolve a bit. After taking a break and having some food he decided he wanted to continue (he was encouraged by the approach of blue skies in the West as well). We reunited with Michael at the summit.

^ Feeling more optimistic now.

^ Getting closer!

^ Looking at the bad weather now assailing Painter’s Basin that had largely passed us by.

^ Victory! 13,528 feet. He was glad he decided to push through to the top.

^ Must’ve been very hungry. We got him a peanut butter and Nutella sandwich after this pic.

^ Someone had left this pale green Utah-shaped rock at the summit that we had fun taking pictures with. Speaking of green—check out how many different shades Max is wearing.

^ The weather, much improved.

^ We met a family of 8 that had all backpacked to the top together (youngest was 13, I think). The mom told us about how they backpack together as a family once every year. I am feeling inspired to pick up a new family tradition…

^ After a few hours apart, we crossed paths with Peter and Ryan on our way down while they were nearing the top.

^ We forgot to get a picture of the two of us at the summit, so this one of us WITH the summit will have to do.

^ Nearly back to gunsight. Getting a “nose for the barn” by this point.

^ We couldn’t resist stopping to take pictures by these cool rocks on our way back to camp.

^ After finishing dinner at camp, we came back out to sit in the meadow and watch for Ryan and Peter as the sun set.

^ Michael brought along this Native American flute that he learned to play at the mountain man rendezvous at Fort Bridger. It was pretty cool. I’m not sure I understood exactly how it works, but you can’t skip from note-to-note with it. You have to slide to whatever note you go to, which was interesting.

Ryan and Peter arrived about the same time as that last picture. The second night, unfortunately, was much colder than the first—probably because of the clear skies.

^ Max drinking the last of his oatmeal while taking in one final chance at the views before heading back to the car.

^ Checking out a pond Max thought was cool before going back to camp. Goodbye, Kings Peak and the Uintas!

^ Unwinding at the car after soaking our feet in the Henry’s Fork River.

We made the mistake of letting the van’s onboard GPS pick our route home (we didn’t have cell service at the trailhead). It started leading us down a nice road at first, but things quickly deteriorated and we had to have spotters outside the van guide us through a tricky 100-point turn next to a stream. The upside is we saw this monstrous and glorious bull moose while backtracking:

I’ve seen a lot of moose while out, but this was the biggest, healthiest looking moose I’d ever seen. After finding our way back to paved roads, we stopped at Don Pedro’s Mexican restaurant in Evanston on the way home which tasted like the greatest food ever. I was really happy with the food we had backpacking, but there’s nothing quite like a monster burrito filled with steak that no backpacking meal can come close to replicating. Michael and Max entertained Peter and Ryan with Star Wars Bad Lip Readings while we drove back to the Wasatch front.

Ryan, if you’d like, you can download all of the pictures (many, many more than what I’ve put on here, of course) from our Kings Peak expedition by clicking the button below:

Elly had a bunch of little friends of hers over for a Bluey-themed birthday party the week before her birthday.

^ Painting flower pots.

^ Keepy-uppy.

^ The leftover head of the piñata.

^ Luna being very helpful while Ailie edits photos.

^ A tired fellow. And Callum fell asleep.

^ Callum’s rendition of “I Have the High Ground.”

Happy 7th Birthday, Peaches! She picked this homemade cookies ‘n cream ice cream for her treat. I thought you might find her faces while waiting for the singing and attention to stop entertaining:

Enjoying one last slurpee run before the end of summer:

Summer 2023, Part 1

Let’s start with a visit from our friends, the Abbotts (Tim was my roommate at BYU for 2.5 years)! They were just passing through on their way to/from Duchesne as they headed home to Oakland, CA. They invited us to come out to visit them this summer and we decided to take them up on it. This is Eleanor and Callum planning to leave with them when they had to go. Their two kids pictured are Evelyn and Phoenix:

Max and I climbing to the top of Mt. Olympus in mid-June. This was our first major hike of the year knowing we wanted to prep ourselves for Kings Peak later in the summer.

^ Just getting started…

^ Trudging up the steep section… the whole hike includes 4,000 vertical feet and this part is definitely the toughest.

^ View from the saddle before the scramble to the summit

^ The scramble—Max’s favorite part. Just the right angle to not be dangerous but to still be loads of fun.

^ Summit!

^ This little guy rode in his backpack the whole way up.

^ He crushed it! An excellent first test to summer 2023.

A couple weeks later I finished my classes on Friday and left with Ailie and Max to take our backpacking gear on its maiden voyage out to Lake Blanche in Big Cottonwood Canyon. My brain was melting in a serious way and I needed some outdoor time.

^ This lady was a chipper champion the whole time, oo-ing and ah-ing about how lovely everything was.

^ Lots of snow melt still coming down the canyon meant full streams.

^ Sunset beginning.

We unfortunately had a late start and idd not make it to our campsite until after dark. However, we were lucky to have no trouble finding a great spot to set up tent and spend the night. We felt plenty warm and comfortable, though I have to confess that I was awake a lot. Air mattress was great… lack of a decent pillow makes things tough, though. Ailie did a lot of thrashing in her sleep. When I’d ask her what she was doing, she’d say, “just thrashin’ around.” She remembered none of it in the morning.

When Max woke up, we let Ailie sleep and wandered around enjoying the views of Lake Blanche in the early morning before the Saturday morning crowd arrived.

^ Sundial Peak over Lake Blanche. There was a thin crust of ice on the lake near the shore that morning even though the morning itself did not seem quite so cold.

^ Max being everywhere all at once (and images that follow).

^ Warm enough to lose the hoodie. All I can think when I see these pictures now is how he was missing all of the beautiful views before he got his glasses!

^ Our campsite (we took the rainfly off to let things air out—we didn’t sleep with only the mesh).

^ A geo cache Max spotted under a pile of rocks while he was scrambling around.

^ Pausing again to be impressed by all of the water on the way down.

A successful first foray into the world of backpacking and it seemed like everyone had a nice time (important). We were pleased with all of the gear we’d got and the packs felt usable and comfortable.

Now a photo of a regal cat taken either by Ailie or Claire:

We went to the Grantsville 4th of July parade with Eric and Lindsie again this year and the quantity of candy thrown did not disappoint the children. It felt appropriate to be celebrating there given that I would start working there in the Fall (I may say more about this later, but I have enjoyed my time there immensely so far. It’s a great little spot with a wonderful faculty and delightful students!). None of the following pictures probably need any description—just kids being cute.

Eric and Lindsie, here’s the link to download all of the 4th of July pics if you don’t have them already:

The next day we went to the open house of the Saratoga Springs Temple, which was very beautiful! We all enjoyed the various colors and motifs they chose for this temple. I don’t remember what Callum was sad about. 🤷‍♂️

Max now sporting his dapper spectacles:

That weekend, I had an unusual break in coursework and it was only Ailie and I at home, so we went for a little hike together up Grandeur Peak. We had a lovely time enjoying all of the wildflowers and greenery!

^ Flowers everywhere!

^ Mt. Olympus is that next mountain over.

^ It ended up growing dark before we’d returned to the car. We bravely talked loud, clung to our flashlights, and tried not to think too much about cougars.

As we were packing up to leave for California we learned that the Abbotts were sick and that our plans to visit them wouldn’t work out. So we wound up doing a staycation—we went to a movie, did a BYU day, went to a nickel arcade, and did some other stuff. We had a lot of fun and many of the kids said they’d prefer it to an actual vacation. 🤷‍♂️

I know, I know… another hike (and it won’t be the last one)! This is the whole family heading up to the Twin Lakes Reservoir as part of the family staycation.

^ Check out those bull moose! Two of them!

Another day of the staycation—a trip to Red Butte Gardens with grandma and grandpa Lewis:

Grandma and grandpa Lewis, here’s the link to download all the pics we took at Red Butte if you want them:

To conclude the staycation we decided to do a little camping trip out to Mirror Lake in the Uintas with the whole family. Unfortunately, Claire woke up sick that morning, so she and mom stayed behind while the rest of us set off for the mountains. We got LITERALLY the very last campsite in the whole place! And it was a good one, with great access to the lake, running water, and anything else we may have needed.

Not pictured is all of the paddle boarding we did the first day—I was out on the water with them, which meant no cameras.

^ Bald Mountain in the background.

^ The marshy area crossing to those trees turned out to be deceptively deep. We had all taken off our socks and shoes, but our pants all wound up mostly soaked anyway.

^ Our campsite the next morning.

^ After the sun came out and warmed things up we started the paddle boarding and swimming.

^ View of some 12,000 foot peaks in the Uintas on our way back to Park City.

^ Fun stop at Provo Falls (and the two pictures that follow).

The one night camping trip to end the staycation (though not really “staying” in this situation) was a great way to conclude things. We all wished we had another day or two to make it the best.

British Columbia 2023

To commemorate Ailie and Claire finishing elementary school (one finished, one about to finish) we took them on a little trip. We’d like to do something similar in three years for Max and Elly when they finish elementary school.

(Above) Getting dropped off at the airport. Cute ladies. At this point, we still hadn’t told them where we were going.

Waiting to board.

On the plane to Seattle. We didn’t fly straight to Victoria or Vancouver because plane tickets were much more expensive. Also, you only need a birth certificate to cross the border by land or sea, but you need an actual passport to cross by air, so this let us work around them not having passports.

The next morning—looking at the ferry we’d shortly be taking from Port Angeles, WA to Victoria, BC.

After boarding…

Coming into Victoria harbor—this is the breakwater, which we’ll walk out to at sunset later in the week.

Victoria skyline as our ferry makes its way into dock.

One of Victoria’s famed pickle boats.

First stop after FINALLY getting through immigration and customs was lunch!

Ailie’s hummus and chips.

Claire’s incredible onion rings. Maybe the best onion rings i’ve ever had. Nicely crisp on the outside, but also don't just slide/crumble apart when you bit them.

Lego model of the Chateau Victoria Hotel In the lobby.

Walking by the Empress Hotel later that afternoon (we’ll come back for afternoon tea the next day).

Enjoying some lackluster gelato.

Awesome view of the BC Parliament from the balcony of our room at the Chateau Victoria.

Night-time view after swimming that night (we had the whole pool to ourselves—it was awesome). Take note of the BC Parliament lit up on the left side of the image.

At Beacon Hill Park the next morning. Just a free city park with lots of lovely gardens, greens, flowers, and wildlife.

Here we are at our tea sitting at afternoon tea at the Empress Hotel. We all got a different type of tea and had fun trying the different varieties. The food was excellent! I have to say that I enjoyed the food at this one more than the one we did in London, but the experience at the place in London was definitely a notch above.

Properly sipping her tea.

(Above) The gluten-full option…

The gluten-free option for Amanda.

Atrium on the back of the Empress Hotel.

Dressed-up ladies portrait out front.

After tea we visited the grounds and toured the interior of Hatley Castle (the shooting location for Professor Xavier’s school in the X-Men movies). The grounds were cool, but the tour of the interior bored us all to tears. 😬

We went to the Fisherman’s Wharf in Victoria Harbor for dinner. We had incredible fish and chips (Amanda and I, that is—Ailie enjoyed her salsa and Claire enjoyed her ice cream). It’s essentially a little food market with a bunch of colorful floating houses all around.

The coleslaw was even delicious (and you know how I generally feel about mayo).

Then a sunset visit back to Beacon Hill Park and a walk out to the Victoria Harbor Breakwater.

The next morning we headed right over to Butchart Gardens. Butchart were the inspiration for Thanksgiving Point’s Ashton Gardens. Less sprawling than Ashton Gardens, but definitely more striking overall (and we love Ashton Gardens). Also, I promise this is a very small selection of all of the pictures we took of flowers, etc. So, just the highlights—promise.

(Above and below) View down into the Sunken Garden.

(Above) Entering the Japanese Garden.

(Below) Walking the Todd Creek Trestle which used to be an old train trestle that’s been converted to a walking/bike path called the Galloping Goose. We wished we’d had more time so we could’ve biked it—that would’ve been pretty cool!

A peek at the Sooke Potholes near the bike path.

The next morning we boarded another ferry from Victoria to Vancouver. This ship was much larger than the other ferry we took from Port Angeles. The whole process also seemed to go much smoother (though, excluding an international border crossing probably helped with that). First, though, pastries:

(Above) We found a rare, awesome gluten free bakery that we visited each morning. Amanda found their breakfast quiches particularly delicious.

Us gluten eaters routinely went to a bakery by our hotel called Crust. Everything we tried there was great, but favorites were the chocolate croissants, cronuts, and sour cherry and lemon cream cheese danishes (not pictured).

This larger Ferry had a full-service cafeteria.

These narrow passages through the San Juan islands were navigated expertly by the ferry’s pilot (they do it all manually)—even with tight squeezes with other ships coming the opposite direction

Lots of cool cabins tucked into the trees on all of the islands we passed.

Using the railing to keep the camera steady…

After arriving in Vancouver, we had lunch and rented bikes to ride around Stanley Park—one of our favorite things we did the entire trip. The bike rental was crazy cheap and the bike paths and views of Vancouver Harbor and the Lions Gate Bridge were awesome!

(Above) Great views of the city and lots of seaplanes

Lions Gate Bridge

(Below) This is a Great Blue Heron I spotted on a rock in the harbor. Caught it diving into the water to catch a fish (only regret was having to frame the whole thing from on top of the sea wall). Click to enlarge.

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More shots of the Lions Gate Bridge

View out towards English Bay

After the bike ride around Stanley Park we went over to the Capilano Suspension Bridge park, which was super cool.

The suspension bridge. A little bouncy when you walk across it, but it also felt nice and strong. In years past, they’ve had massive trees fall over on it in storms and it’s held. Apparently it could hold a jet.

The view while crossing

Up on the treetop walk. Reminiscent of an Ewok village.

Another Great Blue Heron.

Descending to the Cliffwalk—also super cool.

Cool bridge on the way out of Vancouver as we returned to Seattle to fly out the next morning:

We had a really wonderful time! Vancouver is somewhere we’d love to go again in the future. Reminiscent of the Columbia River Gorge, but with some other interesting opportunities nearby as well.

February–May 2023

A happy fellow’s birthday cake:

Callum enjoying his cheeseburger at “the bestest place ever”:

Ailie joined Claire and me in St. George for Claire’s soccer tournament. We had a good time enjoying some slightly warmer weather and being outdoors without rain and snow. Unfortunately, this tournament did not go well for Claire’s team… but we still had a good time on the trip!

Enjoying Pioneer Park in St. George after one of Claire's games...

Claire’s “Gollum” pose.

Now Ailie “Gollum-ing.”

Quick Stop at Coral Pink Sand Dunes… (it was pretty cold and the sand was damp, so we didn’t stay here long…)

At the Petrified Dunes in Snow Canyon State Park (we went here in January with all of our other kids, but Ailie and Claire were feeling sick that day and didn’t come along, so it was good we got to stop in while we were there for Claire’s tournament).

Down in the Lava Tubes! We explored them all the way to their ends—very cool. When we came with the whole family in January, we didn’t go very far in.

Meanwhile, back in Northern Utah…

Enjoying the crazy snowstorm that shut things down for a couple of days.

We spent a good chunk of the day digging a big snow tunnel/fort that we could all fit in.

Snow blowing off the top of the Oquirrh Mountains just before sunset.

A queenly perch.

South Timpanogos after a snowy photoshoot mom had at Tibble Fork Reservoir.

North end of the Oquirrh Mountains as seen at sunset from the Grantsville Reservoir (also after a photoshoot like the other mountain sunset pictures). Winter does make for some dramatic mountains.

We wound up with a couple of conference tickets after taking pictures of the De Hoyos family (Laura’s brother-in-law’s family).

This shot and the next two were supposed to be the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point at the start of April. As you can see, there was still a lot of snow and not many tulips.

Rose Springs chalk fight fundraiser (always a hit).

Descending the Secret Stairway in Middle Canyon

And now the annual easter egg hunt at Grandma and Grandpa Lewis’s house. I got a lot more picture of all of the kids—you can click the button below to download the full-res copies of all of them if you want them.

A little climb Max, Callum, and I did to the top of Ensign Peak (we were getting itchy for hiking season by this point).

Claire’s class lining up for the mini-marathon. She went on to take first. Max took third in his, Ailie got eighth (but ran consistently the whole time, most people did bursts and stops), and Elly enjoyed strolling with a friend who was sad.

This pic and the next two are from a hike Max and I took up to the top of Grandeur Peak. It was fun to do it in early spring!

These shots are all from Ailie’s 6th grade promotion. We were surprised when she was announced as the speaker because she hadn’t told anyone about it (she wanted it to be a surprise). We could tell she felt great about finishing with a bang.

Grandmas got the privilege of sitting with this guy.

Her friends, Emsley, Sammy, and Brilya.