Off The Trail

Nick's friend, Will, was with us in Jackson Hole last week.

His mom, Heidi, loves to hike too. Will pretty much lined us up to go on a hike this week! 

A favorite trail for both of us, Desolation, was closed because of the fire on Mt. Olympus.

So we decided to try something new. Red Pine Lake up Little Cottonwood.

8 miles, and 2,700 in elevation. Not as steep as some others, but longer. 

Coincidentally, a friend posted about Gloria Falls that's right off the trail, albeit a little hard to find.

It wasn't too difficult to find the falls. 

But we got a little confused about where to go to continue on to the lake. 

And dang, we mountain goated straight up a cliff!

It was definitely sketchy and we had to rely on the branches of trees to get us up and down. 

It was tricky.

At the top, it was clear there was no defined trail.

But there was this cool tree that we think was an antler scraped by an elk or moose!

Or deer.

Fortunately, when we turned around back to the original trail, we found a couple who directed us the right way. And once we knew where to go, it was weird that we didn't realize it from the beginning!

It turned out to be an all-day adventure, but was fun to talk with a new friend.

Hilarious documentation of our round-about, doubling-back totally confused part of our hike!

Also had dinner with the Pingrees at Market Street to celebrate all of our (50th) birthdays. 

Mike is in July, Dan is August, and me and Jenn on Sept. 12, of course.