Orderville Canyon

Charlie, Nathan and I hiked Orderville Canyon on Labor Day. The trees grow in amazing ways in the sandstone and some of the rocks are really interesting. As you descend the canyon, springs crop up frequently and water starts to run down the bottom of the canyon, feeding beautiful wildflowers. There are maybe a dozen short dropoffs that required climbing or jumping down, often into pools of water at the bottom. A couple required ropes as handlines. All were tons of fun, as each presented a different challenge in order to get down. The water wasn't too cold, though the day was none too warm. All of the dropoffs were gorgeous!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Mt. Nebo Hike

I've had lots of adventures this fall, but have been too busy recovering from them to blog about them! So, we finally have enough cold and snow to shut down mountain biking and not enough to ramp up snow sports. Plus Charlie went to Japan this week, leaving me a lone man.

One of my favorite adventures this fall was hiking Mt. Nebo in mid-October. Mt. Nebo is the highest peak in the Wasatch Mountains, at nearly 12,000 feet.

Here are Charlie and me early on in the hike. We had picture perfect weather. The first snow of the season had dusted the summit the previous day, but the day was warm and inviting, perfect October weather.

This is our first: "Whaaaaat? We're hiking that?" moment!

Charlie has that moment too.

Heading toward Wolf Pass, a gorgeous meadow at the shoulder of Nebo and North Peak. We hiked North Peak, another 11,000-foot peak, on the way back. The trail takes you within a couple hundred-foot scramble of the summit.

Wolf Pass looking up the trail toward Nebo summit. This is the trail to the northernmost and the highest of the three Nebo peaks. The trail doesn't look nearly as daunting up this close.

We had clouds on the east and clear weather on the west. It looked like the end of the world as you approached the dropoff!

The ridge taking us to Nebo. A light dusting of snow added a bit of slipperiness but not much.

The dogs LOVE the snow!

The late summer kept the flowers blooming at 11,000 feet, making a pretty sight in the first snow of the year.

The dogs on the summit. A little two-seater plane buzzed us and waggled its wings at us just 100 feet away. It was trippy to be as high as an airplane and a little higher as it dipped down!

Me on the summit looking north.

Me on the summit looking south!

The Festival of Trees

We went to the Festival of the Trees yesterday. I think that’s the first time I’ve been since I was a kid. People donate and buy trees for Primary Children’s Hospital. Only it turns out that people also donate and buy a bunch of stuff surrounding the tree, which can amount to several thousand dollars worth of stuff, like sports memorabilia, digital pianos, ski passes, etc. It was quite a spectacle. I was rather taken in by it all despite the fact that it wasn’t really my cup of tea. Some of the trees and surrounding spreads were decorated in ways that seemed to say a lot about the person in whose memory they were created. There were some outdoorsy trees and superhero trees and sports trees to compete with the more traditional trees and female-oriented trees. I most enjoyed seeing photos of people in whose names the trees were dedicated. It presented the best and worst of Christmas: a charitable cause, giving, and memory of loved ones combined with spectacle, material goods, and glitz. It would be nice to have one without the other, but it seems there must needs be opposition in all things. Then in the middle of it all, I was arrested by one display. It had a rudimentary carpenter’s table with a simple sign: The Touch of the Master’s Hand. I had almost forgotten what Christmas was all about. It IS about giving and family, for sure. But it seems impossible for us as humans to have that without also having the materialism. The only way to overcome our all too human tendency to be attracted by this world is by combining our charitable impulses with Jesus. Charity without centering it in Christ can too easily get off track. It becomes generosity rather than charity. Generosity is certainly praiseworthy, and the Festival is laudable in so many ways. Yet it was much more meaningful once I remembered Jesus and the simplicity of His way.