On Saturday Mark & I headed up to Solitude Mountain Resort for a delicious brunch at the Creekside Restaurant before meeting Mark's Dad for a 3.5 mile hike. We set out from the car park (8,730ft) at Silver Lake (which freezes over in the winter and is used for Nordic skiing) and headed around the lake and up the trail to Twin Lakes Reservoir
The initial climb up from Silver Lake is quite steep gaining 700 ft over the first mile of the trail. Here are Mark & Dan on the trail now high above Silver Lake.
The original "twin lakes" are now joined into one lake by the concrete dam wall of Twin Lakes Reservoir. Across the lake to the South is Mt Millicent 10,452ft (3186m).
Here we are taking a break on the shores of Twin Lakes Reservoir. We then skirted around the northern shore of the lake, climbing again towards Mt Evergreen.
The 400ft climb up to Evergreen Peak is quite steep and required some scrambling up a narrow, rocky ridgeline. You can see Dan a little way down the ridgeline from me.
The trees up here have to weather some pretty harsh conditions. I thought the scarred trunk of this tree had an artistic beauty to it.
Mark at the top of Evergreen Peak (9,843ft or 3000m).
After descending from the Evergreen Peak trail we looped around to the north west, returning to the carpark via Lake Solitude, a tiny alpine lake in a steep-walled bowl.
We also met a couple of "natives" - two mule deer (named for their mule-like ears), grazing just off the trail.
After our southwest road trip, Mike & Lindsey spent a couple of days with us in Salt Lake City before returning to Houston. For a change of scenery from the heat and red rock we took them for a hike and picnic up Big Cottonwood Canyon. We were surprised to find that although it was almost Summer, the cool temps and snow were still lingering up the canyon. We had planned to do the Brighton Lakes hike, but the amount of snow still on the ground at the base made that one a no-go, so we opted to do the 1 mile hike around Silver Lake (that has no elevation gain). In the winter this lake freezes over and is used for cross-country skiing as part of the Solitude Nordic Center.
Even here, on the shady part of the trail it was still covered with hard-packed snow (and lots of fallen pine needles and cones).
And the southern side of the lake (that is shaded by tall pines for much of the day) still had a layer of ice and snow covering it.
Feeling that a 1 mile hike wasn't quite enough we headed further back down the canyon to hike up Mill D North Fork (about 700ft lower than Silver Lake) where the trail was free of snow. The first part of the trail winds through thick forest of spruce, fir and pine. 
As the trail climbed higher, the pine trees were replaced by aspens that hadn't yet sprouted their summer leaves. At one point we disturbed a herd of deer that were grazing among the trees.
After a hiking about 2 miles we came alongside Mill D North Fork Creek a pretty spot to rest up and take in the view back down the valley towards Mt Kessler, before heading back to the carpark.
