Another Local Hike: Jardine Juniper

This one was a few weeks ago at this point, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen or that it doesn’t deserve — nay, require — coverage on my important weblog.

This is a hike in Logan Canyon. It starts low enough that it wasn’t under snow at the time we did it. It runs about 10 miles total and ends at the famous Jardine Juniper, once thought to be the oldest tree in ALL OF UTAH, but later established to not, in fact, be as old as some other trees within the state. Still, it’s like 1,500+ years old, so: it’s old.

Point being: dogs.

Did this hike with Eric and his dog (hence the second dog). Once you get high enough, you start getting views that make Logan Canyon look like Switzerland.

I mean, a little bit. Fewer tunnels, cheaper restaurants (cheaper everything).

And then here’s a badly lit photo of the old tree.

And one other photo, just because I exported it and what the heck.

Thoughts:

  • There were a couple places you could camp along the way. (These aren’t all deep thoughts.)
  • A lot of mountain bikers — possibly a function of going up there on a Saturday.
  • Eric’s dog ran away for a while. Mine was pretty good, although she seems to enjoy peeing on the trail more than I’d prefer.
  • Steep in places.
  • Took my new ABC watch, which did a good job of reporting the elevation gained, which I think was why I bought it?
  • There’s eventually a choice to take either the “scenic route” or the “shady route”. We took the scenic to the tree, then the shady on the way back.
  • The two routes are pretty equivalent in both scenery and shadiness. For the record.
  • At one point it occurred to me to wonder what the tree would tell us about all it had seen if it could talk. It then occurred to me that it would probably say stupid things like: it was cold sometimes, but not other times, and then one time it was hot and later there were some birds and then they left and… And the whole conversation would probably be the worst and awkward to get out of.

bkd