Up a Trail Without a Flashlight

Our Sunday evening turned out to be unusually busy. I (this is Matt tapping the blogging keyboard today) went with the Scouts to sign off our physical wellness forms before leaving for scout camp, we called our families, ate dinner (Potstickers from the freezer ... mmmmmm), then the both of us enjoyed a slice of carrot cake with a young fellow named Marcos who turned 1 this past week. To cap off the evening, I was able to convince Jessica to go adventuring with me, and the two of us, with bikes, helmets, water and a camera, powered up the side of Y mountain to catch the sunset.

The adventure started with a fortuitous meeting, still in Provo, with an old friend from Cinnamon Tree. After a hearty greeting and farewell, we pedaled eastward until the road started to climb. Anyone who's ever biked up a mountain, or even a minor gravel heap, probably understands the sensation of every downward pedal stroke getting harder and harder. We followed the neighborhoods up the hill until we could see over most of the houses below us. To our chagrin, the road we were on did not lead to the Y.

Undaunted, and knowing that people in this neighborhood were surely as lazy as we were, and would not want to regularly go back down the hill in order to get up to the Y, we scanned the roadside brush for any signs of a trail. Our well-trained eyes soon spotted a small trail leading away, into the bushes and supposedly up the mountain to our destination. We followed it. Jessica was very excited at this point to

have me as a guide. The trail appeared abandoned. We followed it for five or ten minutes, dodging branches and stepping over grass clumps. Portions of the trail were paved, nearly overrun with plant life, and portions were merely a thin carving in the dirt. We wound our way through this unknown path. It got steeper, and steeper, and the sun was setting fast.

Then, we met The Hill. It was like no hill we had yet encountered. It towered above us, its rocky crags challenging our will to climb, mocking our desire to view the sun's parting rays (as an informative side note, bikes seem to become heavier - maybe 30-40 lbs - when climbing such a hill).

We made it to the top sweaty, but very much alive. From then on, we breathed heavily, enjoyed the final descent of the sun into the horizon and the twinkling lights of Provo coming to life beneath us. The desert flowers were blooming along and way the sun colored the mountainside a bright pink-ish orange before sinking out of sight. Most definitely worth it.

As is usually the case, the photos do not do it justice.

Once dark, we realized that we were nowhere near a road, nor did we have any sort of light source. Jessica was not very impressed that all we had was my sense of adventure, saying that if she had her way, she would prefer a flashlight.

We continued uphill, and after another hill or two like the monster mentioned before, we arrived at the road that leads to the parking lot for Y hikers. We made our way slowly down the mountain, and biked home, making it just in time to brush our teeth and collapse into bed.