Images (.JPG format):

• IMG05010 - Looking down Beartrap Fork.  One of the now-collapsed wooden bridges is in the mid-foreground.
• IMG05011 - Ron, paused briefly on the Beartrap Fork trail.
• IMG05013 - From farther up Beartrap Fork, looking down the fork and across the canyon, with Twin Peaks in the center of the picture.
• IMG05016 - A look down onto Desolation Lake.
  
• IMG05017 - From the far end of the traverse above Desolation Lake, a look back across Big Cottonwood Canyon.  Similar is #5015.
• IMG05021 - A few minutes before sunset, the sun hanging just above the horizon.  A zoomed-in version is #5023.
  
• IMG05033 - The last bit of the solar disk disappearing below the horizon.
• For a sequence of the setting sun, look at these images, in order:  #5027, #5028, #5029, #5030, #5031, #5032, #5033, #5034, #5035.
• You can also try to view one of two identical short videos:
• wnh20070801_beartrap_fork_sunset.avi in DIVX format, or
• wnh20070801_beartrap_fork_sunset.mpg  in MPEG-2 format
• (If one won't play, try the other.  If neither will play, you may need to download a codec.)
• IMG05044 - A look toward the southwestern corner of the valley.
• IMG05049 - 2/3 of the obligatory group picture, from a point above the end of the traverse, near the rope and pole contraption that is probably used for avalanche control.  Tim and Mike were to the south and east of us, coming back to the top of Beartrap Fork, having watched the sunset from a vantage point there.  Somewhat of a blur due to the time exposure.
  
• IMG05055 - The obligatory group picture, taking using available lighting.  The ghostly, green apparition on the ground at our feet is from my waving the green laser about during the exposure.  L->R:  Mike, Gordon, Ron, Bruce, Tim, Clint.  This is one of several attempts to take the picture.  Other probably less-successful attempts were:  #5052, #5053, and #5054.
  

• No panoramas this week:  Too dark and rainy - plus I forgot.
  

• A detailed map with the GPS track of the hike (plus surrounding landmarks, 1.33 Meg)
• The elevation profile of the hike - This shows the ups and downs of the trail.
  

This was another day in which the black clouds boiling up out of the southwest might have seemed to threaten plans for the hike - but like last week, they did little more than dampen things.  For much of the hike, it was cloudy to the south and west, but relatively clear to the north and it was this combination of light and dark that made for a spectacular sunset - but I'm getting ahead of myself.

In departing the trailhead, Ron and I were in the lead, Tim was with Mike while Bruce and Gordon were trailing behind.  As the accordion lengthened, the three pairs of hikers were separated by their relative speeds, with Bruce and I keeping in occasional radio contact.

The trail wasn't particularly muddy overall, but it was quite wet - mostly from the wet leaves transferring water to the person in the lead (Ron) and before too long, his jeans were quite wet and for all of us, our shoes were fairly wet and muddy.  Eventually, Ron took to whacking the tall plants in front of him with a stick to shake off at least some of the water - something that may have reduced his absorption rate a bit.

Almost immediately after starting, Ron halted and motioned to the left where a Cow moose and a calf were trotting away from us.  Further up the trail, we had additional moose and deer sightings - but since we were in the lead, Tim and Mike saw only a few deer (with the moose having long since gone elsewhere) while Bruce and Gordon didn't see any large fauna at all.

This is one of those hikes that reminds one of the old saw "It may be steep, but at least it's long." and this hike is, in fact, one of the steeper WNH hikes, gaining about as much elevation as anything that is in the regular Wednesday Night Hike repertoire.  The steepness is particularly noticeable at about the time one breaks out of the last stand of quaking aspen on the trail near the top of the canyon, where the trail all but disappears, and one slogs up a slope strewn with rocks, interspersed with grass and a few wildflowers.  Eventually, one practically stumbles across the well-worn Great Western trail, occasionally dodging the odd mountain biker.

Ron and I continued along the traverse above Desolation Lake, stopping at the far end, just above the rocky outcrop called "Red Lover's Leap" at a point that looks down toward the Kimball Junction/Park City area.  There, we paused for a while, rehydrated, and took pictures.  Just after a spectacular sunset (which occurred at precisely 8:47PM from our vantage point) Bruce and Gordon appeared - but not Mike and Tim, whom we had assumed were not too far behind us, but in front of Gordon and Bruce.

After dawdling about (and taking 2/3 of the "obligatory group picture") we headed back, occasionally calling Mike and Tim on the radio - but with no response.  Again, Ron and I were somewhat in the lead, heading down the indistinct trail on the barren slope.  It wasn't too long after rejoining the well-worn Beartrap Fork trail, however, that Ron stopped:  Ahead, he'd heard a human-like noise and we then saw a flashlight farther down-canyon.  We soon made a DX voice contact and reported the Tim/Mike sighting to Bruce, who then reported that he was a little ahead of Gordon.  We were relieved that we'd found both Mike and Tim, as they were the evening's chauffeurs.

After a few more minutes, we joined up with the pair and they'd reported that they had both managed to forget to bring radios.  They also explained the mystery as to why we hadn't seem them:  Near the top of Beartrap Fork, they'd seen some people off to the right, along the Great Western Trail, and they'd assumed it to be Ron and I.  Soon, it became clear that they were some mountain bikers, but since they were already on the trail, they'd continued toward the east, reaching the highest point on the trail in the neighborhood where they not only had a good view of the sunset, but could see in the direction of the Brighton Bowl where they saw the vestige of a rainbow appearing to hover around Clayton Peak.  After watching the sunset, they figured that they'd better head down and assuming that they were bringing up the rear, they were surprised to later find out that they were in the lead.

The hike down-canyon was mostly uneventful:  We were all fairly wet from the vegetation and Ron, who had been chilled somewhat on top (with his wet jeans and cool breeze) but Ron was again warming up through exertion, and most of us seemed to avoid any serious trips, falls, and spills, comforted by the fact that at least four people had already been along to knock much of water off the leaves.  Mike, necessarily more careful in his descent that Ron, Tim or I, dropped slightly behind us, catching up when both Tim and I had to remove boulders from your (now muddy) shoes.  Mike also reported having seen small mammals scurrying across the trail just in front of him, but nothing that he could identify.

When we got down to the vehicles, we were suitably tired.  While there was no rain, per se, the air was heavy with moisture, causing the headlights of passing cars to light up air overhead in a film noir-esque way just before they came into view.  After a few minutes, Bruce staggered into view, reporting that his last "Gordon Sighting" (that is, seeing the tell-tale green glow of Gordon's flashlight) had been some time ago and that he suspected that he'd amassed a 15 minute lead.  After about 15 minutes, we'd wondered if Gordon was doing all right, so Ron started up the trail:  He hadn't gone very far before spotting Gordon's green glow getting closer.

After regrouping, we spent a few more minutes, in the dark, for the obligatory group photo.  Sans flash, we used whatever light sources were onhand - namely our own flashlights, illuminating our faces as best we could.

The trip down the canyon was uneventful and from parking lot, most of us wandered over to the Belgian Waffle Inn to engorge ourselves with various sorts of heat-congealed unfertilized chicken ovum, slightly fermented and coagulated - and then melted - bovine mammary excretions, smoke-cured porcine muscle tissue, and various items made from different sorts of seed pods, some of which were leavened, all polished off with di-hyrodgen monoxide chasers.

Comments:

• All images taken using a Sigma SD-10 camera and were taken using the 18-50mm zoom lens, except as noted in the EXIF data.
• Because all of the images were originally taken stored in raw binary format, they have been down-processed to .JPG for web posting:  If requested, different color/contrast/brightness may be applied and/or higher-quality uncompressed versions may be available for most of these images.
• If you want one (or more) of these images and wish some sort of adjustment (color, brightness, exposure, etc.) please let me know:  All of these image have been processed in some way.
• These images are numbered in chronological order.
• No-one ever said that all of these images (or any of them) were good.  Some of them may have definite focus/exposure "issues."
• EXIF data is present for most of the images, showing time, date, and precise exposure conditions.  Recent versions of Irfanview will show this in the "View->Image Information->EXIF" tab.
  
• Note that cropping/noise reduction required the use of another program which may have removed some/most of this EXIF data.
• Images suffixed with "h" (if any) are half-size.  This was done for images that were somewhat out of focus (due to misfocus or camera/subject movement associated with long shutter times) or those that required some extra noise reduction and had lost some detail anyway.
• If you took some pictures of the hike and send them to me, I'll post them - and give you the blame!
  

We last went here in 2006 - click here to read about that hike.

Go to the 2007 Wednesday Night Hike page, or main Wednesday Night Hike page or the Wednesday Night Hike Cross-Index page