The Niederhauser Chronicles: Ruth Lake

All I have are good memories of this short little overnighter. I wanted to try taking Harvey backpacking and thought this would be a good year. We found a good hike up in the Uinta's - but had a few back up options we almost did instead because we heard mosquitos were really bad. I'm so glad we stuck with the original plan! I hadn't been to the Uintas for a LONG time. My dad wanted to go too. Tanner had a golf tournament otherwise he would have come too. We stopped at Provo Falls to throw a few rocks in and then continued on up to the very crowded Ruth Lake trailhead.

Here we go! A mild .8 mile hike to the lake. Despite all the good memories - there was more whining than there should have been on a hike like that. Greta maybe was a titch young to go but for the most part she did good and had a lot of fun. I decided to take her along because she usually is a much more happy, eager hiker. Oh well - it was good practice for them! They only carried some water and a dehydrated food pouch. Pretty cush.

It was SOOO dang pretty. Everywhere. Geez it was amazing. I forgot how incredible those mountains are and the wildflowers were incredible! I didn't expect them to be that awesome - I guess all the water and snow did good things for later flowers.

The beautiful Ruth Lake

Greta and her photo skills

Getting camp set up. It was so fun. We got a new tent last year with a dividend because we didn't have a good backpacking one anymore. So this was it's maiden voyage. It was perfect. Gosh I missed backpacking so much. It was so glorious to be out more remote and just doing the backpacking thing! It was a popular lake so there were quite a lot of other little camping groups but that was ok (except for the group that came up late and motorized sawed down a bunch of stuff and stayed up talking and laughing loud till like 3 in the morning!!)

Helping pop do some sawing

She requested I take both of these pictures. Her pose. Haha. It kills me. And I only did her hair with a few elastics. And the bug spray disintegrated those 2 minutes into the hike and so her hair was just crazy the whole time.

It was PERFECT weather and the mosquito's were not at all bad during the day (got a little more pesky at night and in the morning but we were pleasantly surprised). My dad rested in the hammock and we went and played down by the lake and stuck our feet in the water. It felt lovely and the kids were being really fun and cute.

My dad joined us a little later and we wandered up to a couple other lakes around Ruth Lake. One was Naomi and the other was Hayden lake. This is a view of our little campsite above the lake. My dad found it and it was perfect. Nicely off the trail and just delightful.

Naomi lake

The other end of Ruth Lake

Hayden Lake. Holy gorgeous wildflowers. Man the picture doesn't even do it justice.

More fun back at camp and at the lake. Harvey found a little spinning hook and some fishing line and my dad helped him wrap it around a stick and they tried casting it and Harvey LOVED it. It's all he wanted to do was to go fishing. We need to get that kid a pole and out more!

We took a detour back to camp and the kids had fun exploring and climbing on rocks. They were really so fun.

They found this tiny pine tree and thought it was so cute and wanted their picture by it. Then Harvey wanted a picture of him hugging it. Hahaha. And then of course Greta did. And then she wanted to hug another plant. Goofs.

We gathered a good pile of wood and had an awesome fire for awhile. Helped keep the bugs at bay. It was sooo nice just sitting by it and enjoying being there. Gosh I loved every second of this trip. Harvey was sad we were only staying one night. Maybe next year we'll go for two!

Oh my goodness he's handsome.

Pretty girl.

The kids did great sleeping. I struggled a bit but that's always the case for me as an adult trying to sleep on a pad or even air mattress. Harvey went down to the lake with pop for some more fishing. Greta and I did breakfast and then met them down by the lake for awhile. We clambered up rocks some more and then Harvey at his breakfast and I wanted to chill in the tent for a bit. Greta joined me. Then Harvey did. And it became a little tickling, wrestling, not resting party.

I love this picture so much for some reason. Eating out of a little backpacking pan, sitting on the backpack, lake in the background. And Harvey. Just captures so much the essence of backpacking.

A little more hammock time. We played a lot of her frozen game in the hammock. And then we packed it all up and headed out. They were a little whinier on the hike out but it went by really fast. It was new beautiful views coming from the other side and I wasn't quite ready to head down. But we missed our Dad and Lottie girl, who my mom was awesome enough to keep and do her birthday sleepover with. We stopped at Dick's (tradition since I was 12 and going to girls camp up that way!) and then headed home!