The battered signpost at the trailhead
Click on an image for a full-sized version.

Images (.JPG format):

• SDIM2360 - With the consistent rainfall over the past several weeks, the trail was unusually verdant.
  
• SDIM2362 - Brett (foreground) and Gordon, scrambling over the rocky outcrop toward the overlook.
  
• SDIM2364 - Gordon and Bruce engaging in mutual mastication during the interperambulatory period.
  
• SDIM2367 - A view down-canyon near sunset, showing a portion of the valley and the Great Salt Lake.
  
• SDIM2369 - The obligatory group picture:  L->R:  Ron, Brett, Tim, Gordon, Clint and Bruce.  #2372 shows the same group, sans Clint.
  

• None this time
  

• None this time

• None this time

• A detailed map with the GPS track of the hike (plus surrounding landmarks)
  
• The elevation profile of the hike - This shows the ups and downs of the trail.  Due to ratty GPS signals, only the "downhill" portion is shown.
  

Notes:

What to do?  There's still a fair amount of snow farther up the canyons, plus there was the hint of heavy weather in the offing - although not really much of a threat.  After being decidedly undecided, we finally decided to make a decision.  After that, we chose to go to the Salt Lake Overlook in Mill Creek Canyon - a destination that we'd not visited on a Wednesday night hike since 2005, where it was also chosen as an early-season hike, and for the same reasons.

So, we got back into our respective vehicles and re-convened in the Olympus Hills parking lot where we crammed into two cars and headed up-canyon.  On the way, we were amazed as to how many cars seemed to be populating the trailheads and parking areas - even requiring us to park in the small "overflow" lots - but not until I'd had to make a U-turn, mistakenly following a car that I had thought to be Brett's that had stopped briefly at the trailhead parking lot, but then continued upwards.

Extricating ourselves from the vehicle, we donned our gear and heard Bruce testing his HT, complete with acoustic feedback.  Bruce wondered if we were on our way:  We answered that we were not, but just about to start.  Walking along the road, we soon caught sight of Bruce's group (with Brett and Gordon) making, what appeared to be final preparations for departure, so we continued up the trailhead.  It wasn't until we'd completed a switchback or two that Bruce reappeared on the radio, indicating that they were taking care of some "unfinished business" and hadn't started yet - but we knew, at least, that they would soon commence to begin to start...

As the "forward" group (consisting of myself, Ron and Tim) continued upwards, we were once again amazed, this time at the number of people that were also headed in the same direction as us (passing frequently) as well as those that were coming back down.  We were also surprised as to how green the area was, the ground on either side of the trail verdantly carpeted with a low, leafy plant and many of the rocks being moss-covered.  As one might have expected, the rainfall earlier in the day made the humidity somewhat high, but the trail wasn't muddy, retaining sufficient moisture to be pretty much dust-free.

After what seemed like countless switchbacks (16-18 of them, actually - depending on what you count as a switchback) we broke out of the tree canopy and soon arrived at the well-peopled Salt Lake overlook.  Fortunately, just as we arrived, a group that had been loitering about on the rocky outcrop toward the west was making their way back to the trail, freeing up the area so that we could loiter in their stead.

After about 20 minutes or so, the "half-slow" group arrived and we sat around looking at the scenery and talking about nothing in particular - for nearly an hour.  As the sun started to set, we got around to taking our obligatory group picture, slowly assembled ourselves and our gear, and then started down the trail, with Bruce well ahead of the pack, disappearing with what might have been a slight red shift.

When we were about 10 minutes from the bottom, Bruce called on the radio, wondering where we were:  We puzzled over how we might answer that question, realizing that about any description we might give, such as "near a switchback" or "approaching the bend of the trail" would be rather useless, as there were so many of both and we couldn't really tell how close to the bottom we were at that point, so our nonsensical answers were probably as helpful as our best guess would have been.  Finally, we started seeing landmarks that clearly signaled our nearness to the trailhead, initially thinking that we might have made a turn off the trail somewhere, but we soon realized that we had, in fact, been there earlier in the evening:  One must always remember that the trail doesn't always look the same way going out as it does going in!

Back at the vehicles, we started down.  I had Ron drive my Jeep as he planned to buy a season pass for Mill Creek canyon and we figured it would be best if it were the driver that was buying it - especially since Ron was the only one of us eligible for the geezer discount:  $20 later, he had the season pass in hand.  (FWIW, the normal rate is $3 per carload, or $2 for the senior discount...)  Soon, we were back at the parking lot where most of us went our separate ways...

The Salt Lake overlook was named after Phineas Overlook, a failed opossum trapper that wandered the area in the mid 1880's.  After failing at trapping, he prospected for merconium, which he believed to be valuable, only to be arrested and jailed for his attempts to carry out such activities.

(If you believe that, I have a bridge for sale...)

None of the above information is from the book "The Lady in the Ore Bucket" by Charles Keller.

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Comments about pictures taken by Clint:

• All images taken using a Sigma Digital SLR camera and were taken using the lens noted in the EXIF data.  (Usually, an SD-14.)
  
• 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!
• The video clips, if any, were shot using a Panasonic DMC FZ-8 digital camera, have been re-compressed, and are of lower quality than the originals.
  

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