Liking Mucho Hiking! A blog about our mucho hikes.

Rating: ⚘⚘⚘⚘⚘ Length: 17.7 miles (My watch said 18.5. My feet said 2,000.) Elevation gain: 3,169 feet.  "Let's do an 18 mile hike," we said. "It'll be fun," we said. Our feet were less impressed with the idea, but off we went anyway. The day dawned bright and beautiful in Somewhere, Idaho (Not really the name of the town, but close enough). It was 45 degress. In July. On Pioneer Day! (We didn't sing as we walked and walked and walked and walked.) We hit the trail a little before 9 after an hour drive to the trailhead. On our way, we noted a lot of fog. We were supposed to hike the day before, but there were big thunderstorms in the area. This trail is a very popular trail to camp along. And many of the campers mentioned that it had been a night. Hail. Thunder. Rain. All the things you want to go on while a thin layer of tent protects you from the great outdoors. It was a surreal experience to start in the fog. We felt like we started the hike really earl...

Rating: 🌲🌲🌲🌲🌲 Length 8.8 miles (my watch said 9.5) Elevation Gain: 3,018 ft  Originally, we were going to hike this trail in the afternoon. But, the weather gave us a gift. And, the thunderstorms that were supposed to happen midday happened in the evening. It was lovely! We started up the Pioneer Cabin Trail and came down the Long Gulch trail. And yes, there really is a "Pioneer Cabin" in the middle of this trail. I usually think of a pioneer cabin as something similar to an 1800s one room cabin. This was built in 1938 by a ski company. So, not pioneer crossing the plains type cabin. More, ski bum type cabin.  Now that we have that cleared up. This trail was in the shade on the way up. The trail switch backed up the way up the mountain. And then, this! Look at those high mountain bowls.  Me on the way to the "Pioneer Cabin". Beautiful tops of the mountains views.  We hit the pioneer cabin at our four mile mark. And, wow. We walked up to the mountain top and vio...

Rating: ⚘⚘⚘⚘⚘ The sign lies just a little. It was a little more than 3.5. And no, this isn't my picture. I may have stolen it because I forgot to take one. (Theft. Lying. This is starting out to be a great post.) Length: 8.5 miles (which is also a lie according to my watch. More like 7.5 miles) and 1784 elevation gain, which seemed right to me.  Sorry to start off by mentioning lies and theft. This was actually a very lovely hike! It got a 5 flower rating out of 5 flowers! The road to the hike, although quite sketchy in parts, was worth the drive. We hit the trail around 4 p.m. (after a white knuckle 5 miles on the questionable dirt road previously alluded to) and were in for a lovely, lovely hike. The wildflowers, the rock walls, the diverse scenery, and the pet dog we acquired for the last quarter mile of the hike was a great experience!  As we climbed up, we noticed really majestic rock walls. Little did we know this would just keep getting better and better. We also notice...

Rating of hike: 🌲🌲🌲 Rating of people: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Length: 2.9 miles Elevation Gain: 232 feet A few years back, my cousin Lisa started the tradition of a summer hike. It has been a great tradition that thankfully she has kept alive and well! This year, Kassie came with us, along with three of Lisa's children: Blaize, Claire, and Jojo. We had a great time in the forests of Mendon. I sense the tradition will continue. Yay! Wayne's Loop is a trail well traveled by many adventurous families with young kids! There are many redeeming qualities about this hike. First, for the most part, it is in the shade. Second, the elevation gain is basically nil. Third, it's not so short that you wonder why you hiked. And, it's not so long that the children despise you by the end. Win-win in my opinion. We opted to go earlier in the day because the mercury was predicted to be 98 degrees. Agony. We all piled into Lisa's vehicle, and off she drove to the charming Utah town of Mendon, Ut...

Rating: 🥾🥾🥾🥾   9.2 miles, 2,076 feet elevation gain You know you are in for a treat when you are hiking in bear country, you don't check the weather prior to the hike, the trail is lightly trafficked, and the reviews don't tell you the full story. Such is the saga of the Mount Hebgen Trail in Montana. Oh, and did I mention there may or may not have been a lightning storm? Minor detail. I wavered on what to give this hike. Three boots out of five, or four? In the end, I decided that the pros outweighed the cons. So, four boots out of five.  When we started out on this hike, we saw a nice group of people who had hiked the trail before.  There was an older local who appeared to have hiked a lot. She told us to talk loud when we asked about bears. She also mentioned that she had never hiked the loop before. We later found that there were some significant reasons for this.  We started up the trail, talking loudly, ready for an adventure. We saw bear scat, but we didn'...