Hiking to the "Y"

Today we did something that I have somehow never managed to do, even though I lived in Utah from age 10 to into my 20's, and attended and graduated from BYU--we hiked to the "Y." Do we ever feel a sense of accomplishment! We is me, Niles, Minnie and Jet. Jumble stayed home with Atom, which turned out to be a good thing because this was not a hike for the faint-hearted and Atom probably would have wanted to be carried at some point. I don't think we would have made it carrying him. This is the view of the "Y" from the parking lot where the hike begins. That's Niles heading up the trail.
This is the view of the "Y" from marker #10. Almost there! The whole hike is a steep walk up. It's amazing how much harder the uphill grade makes it. It is only a little over a mile to the "Y" but it took us about an hour because it is so steep--you have to stop and rest frequently. The last little stretch was even more steep than the rest of it--killer! You probably would give up then if you couldn't see how close you were to your goal. That, and the 7-months-pregnant women (yes, we saw more than one), senior citizens, and toddlers you would see coming back down the trail. You would feel like a total wimp when they obviously made it!!
This is Minnie on the last few feet--the only level ground on the whole 1.1 mile trail, so don't be fooled.
Here you can see the parking lot we started at way below behind Minnie. 1,000 feet ascended in just a little over a mile.
Niles and Minnie with the white "Y" behind them.

If you look really closely, you can see Jet on the top left-hand corner of the right-hand side of the "Y" He's that little dot crawling around. He is the only one of us that had the desire to expend the extra energy to climb to the top of the actual "Y" itself once we got up there. I had more than a few nervous moments about him starting a free-fall roll down the steep incline.
This is the view of BYU campus, Provo, and Utah Lake from up on the "Y"
Minnie expresses her happiness at being at the "Y" by making her own "Y." I made it!
The accomplished hikers pose in front of the "Y" (It looks way too long and skinny up here. How did those ambitious folks who built it in the first place tell how it was going to look from way down on the valley floor? It's not like you can easily trot up and down to see how it's shaping up. Who ever thought of this crazy idea in the first place? I would have thought it was impossible to construct such a thing on such a steep slope--they had to clear all the brush off first, too. Ugh!) This is the gate to the trail where you start and finish. This is us at the finish. The trip down took about half the time as going up. Much nicer, other than the feeling that your toes are going to ram through the front of your sneakers.
Back down on the valley floor, this is the "Y" as we normally see it (and the drive-thru of Wendy's where we rewarded ourselves with frosty's.)
Jet enjoys his frosty. He has to sit in a booster again because Utah just passed a law that you have to be 8 years old or 57" tall to ride in a car without one. Jet is currently 7 years old and 47" Something tells me he won't grow 10 inches in the next year!
Minnie with her frosty. She looks a little pink, even though we didn't forget the sunscreen. The necklace was a gift from her cousin who recently visited Hawaii. Our goal is to do hikes all summer, then go back and hike the "Y" again in the fall, to see how much easier it is when you are in better shape.

The weather was just about perfect--not too hot for us and the breeze felt good. It's finally decided that it's O.K. to be in the 80's--as of yesterday! I wish we had stalled in the 70's for a few days instead of skipping from the 50-60's straight to the 80's, but I'm not going to complain. Yesterday I was driving around thinking how great it was to be warm for the first time in almost 5 months. The windows were down in the car and it felt great! Then I looked around and realized that everyone around me had their windows up and their A/C on. Two days ago they were all driving around with their windows down while I had my windows rolled up and the heater on! Maybe by this time next year I will be in synch with the rest of the locals. It really is a strange adjustment for us. My kids have two weeks of school left and they were still wearing jackets to school earlier this week! :)