One of our attempts at a family tradition is the summer backpacking trip. It started with just me and Abby, and now includes Seth and Caleb. This summer we decided on Hidden Lake on the west side of the Tetons. It’s actually more like the Yellowstone area, with more gentle hills and thick lodgepole pines. We planned on a 3-day trip, and left at noon on Thursday. The 4.5 mile hike in went pretty smoothly. Abby and Caleb carried their own gear plus a little extra, Seth just carried his extra clothes and a bit of food. That left the rest for me, but honestly it wasn’t much. I tried to really pare things down to bare necessities.
The lake is pretty, just a small tree-filled bowl with no outlet stream. Caleb and Seth enjoyed the mud around the shore. The water leaves the lake at a spring about a quarter mile away where we camped. It was a nice spot, and we had it all to ourselves. On the downside, the mosquito infestation that we’d been experiencing since the trailhead blossomed into a full-scale attack. Luckily, we were well equipped with headnets and repellent. After a dinner of bean burritos and a quick fill of water containers, we hit the tent for a few games of “pass the pigs”.
The next morning we had our customary backpacking breakfast of instant oatmeal mixed with hot cocoa powder. Delicious. Then we put on our Camelbaks for a hike up the trail to see what was up further. The answer - mosquitos and more trees. After hiking for a while, it became apparent we weren’t on our way to any grand vistas, at least not in a distance we wanted to hike. Beside that, the mosquitos were just horrible, so we decided to head back, pack up, and go home that day. Seth was a little bummed because he wanted to stay another night in the tent, so I told him I’d set it back up in the backyard and he and Caleb could spend another night in it, and that made him pretty happy.
All told, we hiked around 8 miles on Friday, most with our heavy packs, for a total of ~12.5 miles over the two days. The kids did awesome! I just couldn’t believe that they could go for two days with no whining at all. Neither could they. In fact, probably the highlight for Seth was that he made a deal that if they didn’t whine at all on the way out that I’d get them a “caffeine pop” on the way home. And they did it. A couple of my favorite comments from the kids were Seth saying that the trip was the best thing of the entire summer, and Caleb saying he wanted to remember the hike so he could bring take his kids on it someday.
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