I've
already been on a ton of hikes this year and until today I haven't been
on hikes that I had planned to do this year. Today was finally my
opportunity to hike Ben Lomond
Peak. I came a little bit short of the peak due to snow, but I'll get to that in a bit.
We
left Tooele at 4:00am to get to the North Ogden Divide Trailhead by
5:30am. Oddly, we arrived exactly when Google said we would. It was a
very warm morning in the valley, but the temperature dropped ten degrees
by the time we got to the trailhead. It was cold, or at least I was
cold.
The trail starts with a couple miles of
switchbacks up the side of the mountain, and coincidentally so did we.
Fortunately the trail's not steep. We climbed about 500' per mile,
which isn't too bad. It was fun to see the parking lot get smaller and
smaller as we climbed. It wasn't fun later to see the parking lot get
closer a little bit at a time.
After
about 2 miles the switchbacks stopped and we continued up the East side
of the mountain with great views down to Pineview Reservoir. It was
odd that as we had great views of Pineview reservoir we were walking
through pines.
After about 3 1/2 miles or so (I can't
remember very well) we climbed over the ridge to the West side of the
mountain and had our first good views of Odgen and of Ben Lomond Peak
(shown below).
From
that point the trail was spectacular. Not that it wasn't great up to
that point, but from that point it was absolutely stunning. The views
were incredible. The air was so clear (under the clouds) that we could
see Mt Nebo to the South, Wyoming to the East, Nevada to the West, and
Idaho to the North. The picture below shows the view back south from
near the peak.
The
trail goes gently up and down for miles until it starts the final
approach to the peak where the switchbacks start again. I'm pretty sure
the picture below is looking North into the Cache Valley and beyond.
As
the trail started going higher, we started to see a bit of snow on the
trail from time to time. Most of it we could either walk on or walk
around pretty easily. The snow was soft enough that you could kick
footholds pretty easily. But it was also so soft that it was easy to
posthole (sink one or both feet deep into the snow).
About
500 vertical feet from the peak the snow covered more and more of the
trail, to the point that it was no longer possible to find the trail.
The rest of my group, being braver than me, continued on, but I decided
to turn back. I had already achieved everything I wanted to on the
hike. Plus, after learning how beautiful this trail is, I'll definitely
be back.
In
the end, I hiked 14.62 miles with over 3,000' of elevation gain. I had
two blisters (but I don't think they count because they're between
toes. What's up with that?) and some sore feet. No sunburn, no
excessive aches or pains, and a new appreciation for the mountains in
the Ogden area.
