Mt. Townsend

DSC01583  At Oak Table for breakfast - this is their apple pancake! It is SO big when it comes out of the oven that the cooks get excited and blow a train whistle to announce it! DSC01584  Sam is thinking - gosh, I can't believe my parents let me get this! DSC01586  It looks like a buffalo! Where do I start? DSC01587  Now we're on the trail working it off! This is a big hike for the boys - 8.2 miles roundtrip and 2900 ft elevation gain. If you use a conservative rule of thumb (2 miles per hour plus an hour for every 1000 ft elevation) then it should take us 7 hours. But we rarely take that long. We will just have to see how it goes!
DSC01588  Huckleberry bear striking! DSC01590  Yum! DSC01592  Trying to get all four of us in the shot! DSC01595
DSC01598 DSC01599  Pearly Everlasting - still some wildflowers in bloom! DSC01600 DSC01601  We stopped for 5 min about once every mile.
DSC01602  Time for silly faces! DSC01604  Sooo...we saw the clouds when we were driving over. But we decided to just go for it. I wonder if we'll break through and have a view??? DSC01606  Aster DSC01607  Magenta Paintbrush
DSC01609  Scarlet Paintbrush (I think) DSC01610  Marmot holes! DSC01611  Ben pointed out the Aster for me. He's a good flower guy! DSC01614  Harebell
DSC01617  All kinds of faces! DSC01618  Waterfall in the middle of the shot. DSC01619  Monkey something? DSC01620
DSC01621  Thistle! DSC01624  It's still foggy! we are entering the clouds at around 5000 ft! DSC01625  About a mile to go! DSC01631
DSC01632  Daddy is singing funny songs from Tom and Jerry (Peco's Pest episode). DSC01635 DSC01637  This looks pretty epic, doesn't it? DSC01638  We are almost there!
DSC01639  Encouraging??!! DSC01640  Such a Sound of Music view...if there was one! This is really neat, though. DSC01644  At the summit! DSC01645
DSC01646 DSC01649  Snack time! DSC01652 DSC01653
DSC01654  This little guy is quite nice :) DSC01655 DSC01659  Mr Chippy has a nice view every day! I love this picture. I had to creep up but QUICK to capture him! DSC01661  Panorama of our summit spot.
DSC01662 DSC01663  The clouds were literally rolling over the summit around us as they came up and over then down the other side. DSC01665  Thanks for being ALL IN, honey, despite your misgivings about the clouds! DSC01666  Crazy boys are the stars when there are no distracting views to compete with :)
DSC01667  Enjoy the antics... DSC01668 DSC01671  Very good, Sam! DSC01672  Playing some Led Zeppelin
DSC01673  The sun popped out for 23 seconds and this is the picture they gave me!!! AAARGH! :) DSC01674 DSC01675  The gum ranger provides some teeth cleaning supplies :) DSC01676
DSC01677 DSC01684 DSC01685  Can you tell these are my favorite wildflowers? DSC01686
DSC01688  On our way down. We actually made impressive time - it was 2 hours to the summit, and 1.5 hours down, so 3.5? Half the estimated time. We all had a great time and the boys were incredible! They did it in great form. I really loved spending time with the family on this trail. We'll have to go back for wildflowers and views! DSC01689 20140901 140148  A couple phone shots. 20140901 140159  See how the clouds are rolling over from left to right (west to east)?
20140901 140350 DSC01692  They were a little tired and we were ALL HUNGRY!!! DSC01693